benxiwf

The performance date is April 28th Robert. I will be in touch with some questions and such.

After a sight-read and rehearsal yesterday, I feel the piece I chose will challenge my students while being accessible so congrats to Austentine for his "Habanera for a Playful Kid" as the winner of this year's competition!

Today, actually!

Sorry for the delay. A preliminary winner has been informed pending how the sight reading with the ensemble goes.

Just want to update all that the results are not finalized yet and I apologize for the delay but we are doing a concert that requires a lot of arranging and haven't had much of a spare minute to devote to this yet. It will come so thank you for your patience

Thanks to all who submitted. I will accept scores until next week

Maybe a clarinet, flute, or oboe. I don't see winds in class. I'd have to borrow from band and is more difficult logistically.

Yes a title makes a huge difference to young people (and older people). It gives an idea that the piece is old when named as such which isn't always attractive as a new exciting work. Anyway, deadline is fast approaching. Can't wait to see some of this year's submissions. Only one has reached my inbox so far!

Some thoughts: Think outside of the box. These are high school students. Consider what they listen to (actually a wide range of music, but it normally is catchy and to the point). Unique elements interest them - fun and effective extended techniques are encouraged. Give your composition a unique name - maybe silly to some but "Concerto Grosso in Bb Major" does not give the image of an exciting new work. Technology is ok! Students here use iPads for almost everything. If you want to incorporate a backing track or some kind of unique element, it would be a welcome addition.

Answers to questions: The orchestra has an imbalance of violins - 3 violin parts may be a good idea. We have 27 vlns (1/2 1st 1/2 2nd), 5 vla, 7 vcl, 4 bass Avoid thumb position cello/bass and excessively complex stops. Two solo violins w/ orchestra is fine but remember they are intermediate hs players. As many submissions as you would like is fine Please limit compositions to no more than 7 minutes (prefer under 5) You can inbox me here or email sbeneasler@gmail.com

Hi All, Some of you may remember the string ensemble competition that I hosted last year, resulting in a performance by my high school string orchestra. I am offering the same contest again! I would love to do even more collaboration with the winner this year - perhaps a Skype "masterclass" with the composer or the like! Anyway, the guidelines are 3-5 minute work for string ensemble. This is an intermediate level high school strings group. The weakest section is the basses so I normally say to keep that part simple. You may also include electric bass, guitar, drums, or piano as we have quite capable musicians on all of those instruments. Deadline: February 10, 2014 For submission, you must include: PDF of score Midi demo or recording of piece. Ability to make clean parts if you win.

I will definitely be opening this up again next year. It will probably have guidelines with some sort of theme. We do a fall concert so perhaps a fall/halloween themed piece may be the contest. I am also considering some kind of special concert with music performed to video/projected images so something along those lines is also possible. One idea I have is a video game themed concert with projections - all just ideas in the air right now. I may keep the young composers piece still just open to any ideas you all have. We will see. Look for more info as we get into the summer and I brain storm next year's concerts a bit more.

I will likely open it up again for a piece for next fall

Unfortunately, I did not record the read throughs though I am sure they would have been interesting for you to hear as you could hear what went well and what did not with this level ensemble. In an ideal world, we would have been able to rehearse all four pieces for a couple weeks so that the students could really know them. However, with an upcoming performance with Mark Wood it is just not possible. The concert that Epitaph will be performed on will occur on April 29th and will be recorded.

We read through all pieces this week and the voting was very close but the winner and the piece we will perform is Timmy's Epitaph. I think my students enjoyed its beautiful simplicity and could relate to the idea of losing a loved one. I will say that I thought Sam's piece was really nice as well. The difference may very well have been that it was a more challenging sight read and thus some did not get as good of an idea of what the final product would sound like. I suppose that is the nature of such a contest. Nevertheless all of them were well written and playable so congrats to all.