Warehouse Serenade

Not long after my divorce, I was homeless. I lived on the road in Hotel rooms during the week, but on weekends I lived in the company warehouse. I had a bathroom, but no heat, or much else in the way of comforts. But the boss kept his Baby Grand Piano there and I played it constantly on the weekends, (after drinking a little antifreeze).

I used to play this on the piano in hopes of impressing my lady friends enough that even despite the cold, they would find a need to disrobe. Sometimes it worked and sometimes it didn't. But when it worked, it worked very well indeed.

I should add that that year was one of the happiest in my life. I had a blast living there.

I added a Flute, Clarinet and a Cello to the piano to make this into a quartet.

Here it is

Box.net - Free Online File Storage, Internet File Sharing, Online Storage, Access Documents & Files Anywhere, Backup Data, Send Files

I am not happy with the ending as is nor with the Cello in the second half, so any and all suggestions and/or comments would be appreciated.

Ron

lol Ron, you have so many interesting stories. I look forward to hearing more.

Anyway, about this piece, I really like it which is kinda odd since this doesn't sound much like your usual style, at least for the first half. After that, it develops into a more irritated sounding, atonal section followed by a sort of more-despairing, lonely section. It held my interest the entire time. I really can't think of any kind of constructive criticism for this piece. My apologies. I know I still owe you a few other reviews. Sorry, I haven't had much time for this site lately or composing with SATs.

Also, I don't think I've told you. I'm starting to learn piano.

Hey Tyler

It's great to hear that you are learning the piano. This will help you a lot in your composing.

I really don't need any criticism on this as much as just figuring out how to end it.

About the other 2 in Orchestra, "The Last Sunset" and "Trojan Asteroids" that you have yet to comment on, worry first about your SAT's and when you have the time take a listen to them. Don't worry about suggestions for those, I just want to know if you liked them or not. I know how hard it can be to come up with the words to say, so just say whether or not you liked them. They are both tonal with a little dissonance thrown in for taste.

BTW Although Math is my best subject, I usually ace all of my courses, so anything I can help with when it comes to the SAT's, do not hesitate to ask me. I am finally a Senior in college now with 1 year to go. I can't wait 'til it's all over.


Ron

I felt the ending worked well enough, maybe having a sustained discordant chord that eventually resolves to an ending chord? It felt a little sudden, I guess I am just suggesting build up to more.

I felt that the piano got a little redundant throughout, and maybe in the second half play around more with the instrumentation. It kind of felt, a little samey. But this is a very minor qualm because I liked it throughout and I don't see any drastic need to change anything frankly.

The first thing I noticed, I didn't like your choice of piano, it was a little tinny, and a little too quiet, you could bring it up a little more volume-wise.

Now for the music... for a while it seemed like you were going on and on with no destination or, indeed, origin. This just means that a lot of the material seemed a little off-topic and unrelated, maybe even monotonous, but then about 3/4 of the way through, you started something new with piano and flute, and I really liked that. The new section that starts about half-way through, the hyper bit... it's really funky.
So why so many independent sections, any particular reason? Were you trying to depict several different things?

As far as ending the piece, I can hear two more notes... simply a V-i resolution, with the 5th degree of V on top coming down to the tonic on i.

Very tonal, a pleasant listen, as always. I heard a few parallel intervals one or twice, normally I would criticize that, but it's your style, you've used it very distinctly in the past, why stop now? Just be aware that most people don't like them and frown upon them in tonal works of certain nature, so make the most out of them when you DO use them. Unlike most of your pieces, I didn't get that outer space/apart from the rest of the world feeling from it, it actually feels very much a part of this world. I do get a very strong sense of sadness and loneliness from it, though.