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Melodies Themes Motives Harmony Chords Textures Form Development Structure Time Originality Creativity Score Presentation Instrumentation Orchestration Playability Execution of Given Challenge Taste 8 8 10 8 10 10 9.5 9 Avg: 9 This is such a beautiful piece. Even though it's not your best work (your words), I feel like the simplicity of this style is what makes it so powerful. Yes, it may be simple, but I feel like the technique is not so simple. And the emotions you were able to invoke were very real. Honestly, isn't that the point of music? The harmony also has extreme focus and purpose. I love towards the end when you just flip the key completely; such a powerful key change moment. The ending is also very nice, with the imperfect cadence. The balance of your instruments are done very well, and not overwhelming at all. This is important, you clearly know how to use the instruments to the song's advantage. Your techniques are fun, the cello knows just the right moment to chime in, the violins have a purpose and the piano does its role in supporting the harmony.

alrightttttt time to respond to some of the comments @Kvothe @Wieland Handke @ComposaBoi @chopin @Luis Hernández i am very aware of the rule violation and i honestly dont care to be honest lol. ive already made peace with it. also, ive gone with the mindset of atleast i've finished a piece and not leave it unfinished like my other pieces. working on this piece was hard enough that im really proud to have enough determination to actually complete it. this is what i thought and heard as well during my researching process. i was listening to dohnanyi's sextet, which included horn, and horn could definitely project powerfully. furthermore, when executing loud dynamics, the virtual instrument that i've used aren't very capable to project strongly. i do acknowledge that. my method was to give the horn rests before and after the high register sections and make sure to only do loud dynamics. but mayyybe i might still have gone overboard with it lmao i'd love to hear more specifics about this tbh ive researched this many times and my conclusion is that it is the standard? maybe ive looked at the wrong discussions but the majority said that for chamber music, the staves besides the piano may be smaller to conserve space, which it did. but they also said that this applies to formatting for the piano part. soo i guess you could say that my score is the piano part. idk glad you hear those things that ive tried to portray! it was definitely the vision that i was trying to achieve and im satisfied you got those impressions. yesssss you noticed the whole tone scale scattered throughout! it was definitely cus of just, "water," but yes it definitely added a tone of mystery too. yes! there were fair few selections of artworks that i had to choose from, here are the two of them there shouldve been two or three more drawings but i didnt download it in time before it got wiped with the middle section, i had wanted a clear contrast between the dreary beginning and ending. so i sketched up a rhythmically active theme. as it evolved (with instrumentation and other embellishments), it turned into somewhat of a "pop-y" sound - catchy, syncopated and all - and i liked how it sounded. it definitely does sound like an adventure! form: b1-b38 = intro (contains fragments of Theme 1 (T1), specifically the first three 4 notes), i imagined this to be like the entrance appearance of the ship, the sound of a creaking old wooden ship b39-b84 = full intro and repetition of T1 (the dreary and mysterious theme) b85-b101 = a whole tone scale "storm," Theme 1 is pitted against Theme 2 motif b103-b155 = full intro and 2 repetitions of T2 (the bright and catchy theme) b156-b193 = a fugue section of T2 and T1 meant as a transition b194-b232 = T1, cut and altered b233-256 = coda, contains the final climax. the "misterioso" part meant to be a call back to the intro (b249 right hand piano arpeggio figure, b250 piano left hand the "atonal" figure) with T2 motif on the horn. definitely due to the massive piano chord arpeggios and the syncopated triplets lmao i think one of my principle of writing for instruments is to squeeze and extract as much as possible out of them. i could definitely see some issues with this but in my mind, i always think of playability, even in the brink of it lol. with the stops, most of them are 6ths, 8ths, open strings, the triple stops are in 6ths with the exception of including open strings, the quadruple stops always have open strings to them, and im aware of the difficulty of executing these in faster speed, the challenging registers (high for violin, low for cello), and the possible positions with each strings. the col legno are performed at open strings as well. i am honored lol i am GLAD and SATISFIED that everyone liked the presentation of the score. i worked soooo hard on it and it is definitely satisfying to see everyone like it thank you so much for everyone that has commented so far! i will definitely try to comment the other pieces. i meant to start early with that (and i did, with 1 piece lmao) but i always struggle to put my thoughts into words as they are very scattered in my mind.

Melodies Themes Motives Harmony Chords Textures Form Development Structure Time Originality Creativity Score Presentation Instrumentation Orchestration Playability Execution of Given Challenge Taste 9.5 7.5 9 10 9 10 9 8 Avg: 9 What I like about this piece, is the diversity of emotions and techniques. And in my opinion, your ending is the strongest part of the piece. But there are many good techniques you use here, so let's go through some of them that I've observed. First is your ability to create anticipation by using certain themes with instruments. You don't rush through your music which is something I admit I even have a hard time with. For example, you understand the usage of rests to help build tension and clarity. This is really important in all types of writing, not just music. The body of your piece has a clear theme / melody, but leading to that melody is what is even more impressive to me. You have a non standard first 1/3, but clearly lead to a more structured body. And as a result, this makes your music creative, but also very easy to follow. And now to the strongest part which is your ending. You flip the harmony and mood completely here. What makes this section so memorable, is the fact that most of the piece is pretty tame. So your ending becomes so unexpected, but it also gives the listener quite the shock. Very well done.

Melodies Themes Motives Harmony Chords Textures Form Development Structure Time Originality Creativity Score Presentation Instrumentation Orchestration Playability Execution of Given Challenge Taste 9 9 8.5 10 10 8.5 9 8.5 Avg: 9.1 The intro is awesome! I love how you start this out, as chaotic, but structured chaos. I observed some instances of the whole tone scale towards the beginning, which I feel adds to the mystery of the voyage. It's clear from the music that you intended this to be a chaotic voyage, with the instances of adventure and reprieve. Fun motive towards the first third / or middle section of the piece. Very swing-like here, and I definitely get a sense of exploration and adventure around this section. Then you change it up the last 3rd (beautiful usage of a rest, creating anticipation, or a scene change), followed up with instances of mystery, calm and some chaos. For some reason I get a bit of a Rachmaninoff vibe here. Very jazzy ending, and yes as I listen to the ending right now, I definitely hear a tiny bit of Rach influence...this is pretty awesome! There was a lot of musical content here, definitely one of the more complex pieces in this competition. Either way, complex or not, this is an extremely creative piece. Your intro was killer, your middle section introduced the fun swing-like motive, the last third was enjoyable and quite melodramatic. Awesome use of the whole tone scale; you didn't overdo it, but used it just enough to add some fun mystery to this voyage. Well done!

Melodies Themes Motives Harmony Chords Textures Form Development Structure Time Originality Creativity Score Presentation Instrumentation Orchestration Playability Execution of Given Challenge Taste 9 8.5 7 9 9 10 8.5 8 Avg: 8.6 Once the flute came in, things started to really pick up. I love your theme, and it was quite easy to spot about a minute in. I had to listen to this a few times to understand the structure, but I realized that this piece has a few motives here. But this is not clear until after a full minute into the piece. The things I love about this piece is your harmony, key changing, the flute, the use of the pentatonic scale.

After reviewing eight of eleven contributions to the contest, there are now three ones remaining which challenge me the most. That are the ones of @InstrumentalistElle , @BipolarComposer and @HoYin Cheung . The reason for this is that they have so much in common, both in terms of their qualities and their style and mood. Since my comments would hardly differ, I have decided to copy and paste passages verbatim, which I will therefore highlight in blue, while my individual thoughts are written in the standard color as usual. With your submission(s), you have presented compositions that best meet the expectations one might have given the “Landscapes-Soundscapes” challenge: Pieces that depict a landscape as a “still life”, utilizing every conceivable timbre of the instrumentation, blending, etc., to create true “program music”. When listening, one can easily imagine a scenery from the nature: clouds, trees, a quiet lake or sea, a sunset etc. All this has been executed very well. On the other hand, the piece(s) are sometimes hard to memorize because there is few or even no thematic material in the sense of a recurring melody that is developed throughout the piece, giving it its own unique and memorable character. In fact, to be honest, as I listened to them in a loop —which is exactly what I did during a walk to familiarize myself with all the submissions—I sometimes thought the next section was coming up in the first piece, when indeed the next one had already begun. So I could imagine that this kind of music would work well as “ambient music”, for example, a CD someone might listen to at night if they have trouble falling asleep. Melodies Themes Motives: The motivic or thematic material of the piece(s) is used primarily to create a „soundscape“ depicting the certain scenes or images, such as the clouds, trees, mountains etc. The development of the motifs does not create any melodies but ongoing sound structures which themselves produce an interesting progression. Harmony Chords Textures: The texture is amazing. Together with the dissonances, the piece – while being slow in pulse – creates scenes with constantly growing tension or, vice versa, release, thus having a very cinematic character. Form Development Structure Time: The composition is not in a specific traditional form, the different sections or passages could be considered as „episodes“ or different „pictures“ of the entire imagery, which is fine for a piece intended to portrait a certain scenary from the nature. Originality Creativity: The creativity and originality clearly arises from the way how the different motifs create „sound snippets“ which finally draw the „soundscape“. Even if there is no „melody“ – which usually makes it more difficult to memorize a piece – the entire impression based on its mysterious mood and timbre makes it unique. Score Presentation: The score is easy to read with no engraving issues. Instrumentation Orchestration Playability: You’ve mastered to evoke an astonishing colorfulness from the string quartet, particularly by applying natural and artificial harmonics and flageolets, whereas that might be challenging to perform. Execution of Given Challenge: You have clearly mastered the challenge of the contest with excellence, creating an inner imagery for the listener with your „soundscape“ that depicts the „landscape“ as described by the posted picture. And the term “soundscape” perfectly captures the nature of the piece. Taste: It's very nice for relaxing, though I prefer music that focuses more on thematic material and form (perhaps that's why I'm more of a fan of the Baroque or Classical periods than the Romantic one). Melodies Themes Motives Harmony Chords Textures Form Development Structure Time Originality Creativity Score Presentation Instrumentation Orchestration Playability Execution of Given Challenge Taste 8 10 8 8 9 10 10 7 Average Score: 8.75

Hi Interlect, I appreciate the little tribute to my music! It was an interesting way to start the day. At the same time, I must retain my professional standards and say I do not appreciate this version. You did not ask my permission to use my material or give me any notice you were doing so. Truth be told, this is plagiarism as I did not hear ONE change to my music. It sounds like a literal copy-and-paste and I would ask this to be deleted immediately.

Melodies Themes Motives: The piece is full of motifs that reflect the various impressions experienced during voyage of the ship. Most of them not in the manner of a melody but rather to create the respective impression: the waves, the storm, and the loneliness of a quiet night. However, there are also some melodic lines that turn the whole thing into “music” and not not only an agglomeration of imitated “sounds.” Well done! Harmony Chords Textures: The harmonic style is—though surprising at first—very varied: dramatic, atonal passages shift directly to more tonal, calm ones and are then interspersed with jazzy sections—which I really liked. One can literally imagine the different situations of the ship’s voyage: storm and heavy waves – and then again the calm, open sea or a lonely starry night. Form Development Structure Time: The composition does not follow any specific traditional form, which is perfectly acceptable for a piece intended to depict certain images, tell a story, or even serve as film music. Unfortunately, the playing time of more than 9 minutes exceeds the limits requested by the contest’s prerequisites. Originality Creativity: There is a lot of creativity! First, your attempt to get the inspiration from a prompt given random people with the task to draw the picture. How many attempts did you need? Or did you go with the first one? Since the result was unpredictable, you had to take up a scenario you perhaps did not think on and translate it to the music! And there is also lot creativity in the music itself. The instrumentation and the contrast between the more dramatic and the playful, jazz-like sections! Score Presentation: The score, while being dense due to the many “virtuoso” passages that need to be engraved, is clear and readable. Perhaps you have decided for the smaller font on the other instruments than the piano to achieve that more staves would fit on a single page. Instrumentation Orchestration Playability: The instrumentation is very interesting: With the piano as the foundation and providing the more rhythmic and percussive base, the strings consisting of a cello and violin—thus offering a large ambitus—and the horn and timpani serving as festive and signaling elements, you have a variety of sounds at your disposal to create a piece with different colors. As for playability, I think it would be at least “challenging” and would require a certain degree of virtuosity if performed by human musicians. Execution of Given Challenge: You have clearly mastered the challenge of the contest with excellence! But – and that hurts me to say – not met the rules of the competition. As you stated yourself that you „might’ve gone overboard with the duration“, you are aware of that rule violation. And I can truly understand that, when being in a „flow“ composing, it is sometimes hard to come to the end if there are a number of ideas which have to been expressed. Concerning the huge amount of effort you must have spent to achieve that final result, you’re tempting me to break the rules as well by giving you a score that takes all (other) criteria into account and doesn’t skip your piece due to disqualification. Taste: Even if that genre (let me call it „soundtrack“ or „movie score“) is not my favorite one, I really like it due to it creative ideas and colorfulness. Melodies Themes Motives Harmony Chords Textures Form Development Structure Time Originality Creativity Score Presentation Instrumentation Orchestration Playability Execution of Given Challenge Taste 10 10 5 10 8.5 9.5 10 9 Average Score: 9.0

Melodies Themes Motives Harmony Chords Textures Form Development Structure Time Originality Creativity Score Presentation Instrumentation Orchestration Playability Execution of Given Challenge Taste 7 7 5 6 8 10 9 8 Average 7.5 Overall a well written piece. The main issue was the structure felt meandering and didn't have much direction to me. The string chords and arco/pizz changes are completely fine, so I gave you a ten there to counter-balance those who said it wasn't good instrument writing lol. Overall, good job!

Yes Good-Luck to all the Contestants.............................Although i think i know who's gonna Win it.

Melodies Themes Motives Harmony Chords Textures Form Development Structure Time Originality Creativity Score Presentation Instrumentation Orchestration Playability Execution of Given Challenge Taste 7 9 7 10 9.5 7 5 8 Average Score: 7.8 Review: This is a very creative piece, starting with the painting (which I love) and the concept. I’m not sure the music in particular evokes that for me, but it’s so subjective... It’s true that the piece goes beyond what was supposedly the challenge. The combination of instruments is original. I think the French horn works well in this ensemble because it has such a powerful projection. Although with virtual instruments, it’s sometimes easy to alter how it would actually sound. There’s a strange shift in style, but I like it. It reminds me of a contemporary opera written in a non-tonal language where, suddenly, everything sounds like jazz. The score is very good, though is there a reason why the piano is printed in a larger font? I also have doubts about those multiple stops, even with techniques like con legno.

Melodies Themes Motives Harmony Chords Textures Form Development Structure Time Originality Creativity Score Presentation Instrumentation Orchestration Playability Execution of Given Challenge Taste 9 9.5 8 7.5 9.5 9 10 9 Average Score: 8.9 Review: Melodies/Themes/Motives - The work is rich in motifs and themes, some of which are readily apparent, whilst others are deeply woven into the fabric of the piece. Harmony/Chords/Textures - The texture is dense, but the individual parts are clearly defined. Form/Development/Structure/Time - I sense a progressive structure, but it’s by no means boring. Originality/Creativity - It is a standard, effective combination. Score Presentation - The score is correct and easy to read. Instrumentation/Orchestration/Playability Reading the comments clears up any doubts about double or multiple stops. Execution of Given Challenge - I think the author has succeeded in achieving his aim.

Entry: The voyage of the sunken ship. Melodies Themes Motives Harmony Chords Textures Form Development Structure Time Originality Creativity Score Presentation Instrumentation Orchestration Playability Execution of Given Challenge Taste 7 7 7 10 10 6 2 8 Average Score:7.12 Review: Execution: One of the requirements is write a piece with in 3-7 minutes. This was 9 minutes. The overall aura of this piece is mixed. At times, it gave off eerie mood then it didn't? Score Presentation: The score was readable and there were no engraving errors. Instrumentation: The imbalance between the strings and horns is problematic. You could not horn at all! Watch out for those stops in the string part. Make sure they are playable! Creativity: Yes, this a creative piece. The over structure and form of the piece is hard to determine. I am not sure if it is sonata, or scherzo, or something else... In general, I would want to see him grow as writer and see more of his works. He has the potential! I love what he did here.

Thank you for your comment, @Kvothe. In actual practice, a string player will still hold the bow and use the index finger (for violin/viola) to perform pizzicato. That way, they have enough time to switch back to arco. quickly without disrupting the performance, at least from my experience as a violinist. The quadruple stops are also taken care of when I write this piece and should not bring too much of difficulty playing. Most of them are designed and indicated to be played as broken chords for better playability and for intentionally lighter textures. Moreover, open strings are used to make the chord more resonant for better projection. The choice of pizz and arco. depends on the texture - Do I want a richer sound to accompany the main melody? I often consider the sound quality before the playability issue. Nevertheless, the 16th notes are projected better in arco. For the double stops in m.58, they are playable using both A and D strings, with the last note played using the 4th finger to press both strings.

Melodies Themes Motives Harmony Chords Textures Form Development Structure Time Originality Creativity Score Presentation Instrumentation Orchestration Playability Execution of Given Challenge Taste 7 6 8 4 9 9 8 4 Average 6.9 Not poorly written per se, but I really just don't like this style. It's sentimental, but like in a shallow way. Thank you for sharing!