Palindrome

1. Techniques used: Noodling around

2. How long it took to compose the piece: An hour?

3. Structure of your piece: Palindromic, with variation.

4. Obstacles when composing: Making it intuitively "musical' while remaining interesting and palindromic. By "palindromic" I mean the fact that, in the first and last parts, the left and right hands are mirror-imaging each other, and also the fact that the song roughly follows an ABCBA overall structure.

5. Summary of overall piece: ??

Enjoy and critique!

I know already that it's too short. :D

-Kris

palindrome.mid

Interesting. Intriguing.

I really am quite fond of this, but I have to agree, it's a little on the short side. You could expand some of these sections even more, just a little more noodling around if you know what I mean. Maybe try adding to the section that begins at around 1:00. Also, your ending doesn't sound too much like an ending to me. I know you wanted the last chords to be unresolved, but I think you could do a better job than you did. I could be wrong, of course. Maybe a performer's artistic inflection could satisfy the completeness as it is, as midis certainly do not. :w00t:

You know I've been doing something similar to this lately, I improvise on the piano so that the left hand is a mirror image of the right hand over a pivotal point. It comes out quite nice if you fiddle with it for a while. What I called it was 'symmetric', because palindrome means the same frontwards as backwards. I can see you used both of these 'devices' in this piece, but only loosely. You did a good job at keeping it musical at the expense that you didn't use the methods strictly, you only employed them here and there.

Oh, by the way, a score would be nice. :happy:

Do more of these, I like experimenting with palindromatic and symmetric music and I'm delighted to see I'm not the only one!

Wow, I loved this piece. Cool use of dissonance. I also liked the repeating rhythmic patterns. Someone needs to perform this in front of an audience, and see how they react! The results could be quite interesting.:wub:

Cool Piece, the repeating pattern is kinda hipnotic, good mood, i like it.

edit. it's too damn catchy for a modern piece, i can't get the "melody" out of my head, it's annoying me :wub:

Great piece and fun to listen to! I agree that it is too short. Possibly instead of making the sections of the ABCBA pattern longer, you could start a new set of variations with the same pattern so the whole piece would be ABCBA,A'B'C'B'A' - just a thought.

Kris,

Glad I met you in the other thread. :) I keep watching your posts and new threads. This is a very fine piece of music!

What I hear first and then what I would like to see from you.

HEAR

Your instincts and your ears are great! They work very well, and you are not afraid to attempt something new.

You have a tendency for repeated patterns, but this, for me, means two things:

a. You can't/don't know how to develop "properly" a larger piece of music. (notice that the properly is in "". There is no right or wrong, ok?)

b. however (in conjuction with a), you know that composing is not pasting down ideas, or melodic fragements randomnly, so in order to keep coherent you repeat your self.

The b is good.

The a needs practice and lots of listening to works.

You have a very intuitive desire in the way you use dissonances and conssonances. You have no trouble with dissonances, but you will mostly "resolve them" or "make them reappear" more consonant, in the well know triads of major or minor.

I will not agree that this is on the short side though. It is 2:12. Not bad at all, considering that it's 2 patterns in all. It's not a melody you take and tear it apart, it's not something you can transpose and go to section b to the contrasting mood, it's not a sonata. For what it is, it's fine at the 2 minutes.

What I'd like to see from you

Firstly and MOST important. (IMO of course). The score! I don'yt know how you make the midi files, but a score is indispensable in classical music. And there are a lot of things to learn with scores, and how to make them look proper. There are many free notation programs in the net, you can try your hands on. Ask and you shall recieve :D

I know that everything takes it's time, and everything moves in it's own paths, but this idea is a bit too much of dramatic and fate oriented for me to accept completely. We can arrange and change our own paths. Same with you and your music.

If you are keen in learning (which really appears that you are!) try and experimenting next time. Try and see several ideas.

Some ideas, in a manner of excersizes:

i. Try and NOT repeat patterns and elements. See how far you can go. Of course in music we always repeat stuff, but see if you can make changes (for example to change the first note of the pattern every time, so while the pattern remains the same, you get new pitches to play with). Or write something really slow, with little patterns.

ii. Try and see what you get if you avoid ALL dissonances, or avoid all conssonances. Keep the same material, but just avoid "bad" intervals, or "good" intervals.

iii. You would benefit greatly to study with a professor and a proper book. There are people here who do "lessons", and you might be well off if you tried contacting those people.

Well, that's about it from me.

I hope you don't mind the lengthy post, or the "father-like" manner I spoke. It get's out of me sometimes. Try to keep it in but...

Nikolas

PS. 1 hour for this? WOW! You could benefit greatly if you stayed in a piece for several days instead of an hour. Composing is muchly the art of working again and again and patience. ;)