De Profundis

I revised this piece on 7/31/08

I wrote this song with the text from Christina Rossetti's poem De Profundis, which is about a soul yearning for heaven but heaven is beyond its grasp. This is my first complete choral piece I have done. I know that the score doesn't have dynamics but I only have note pad and cant add them in. :thumbsup:

Here is the text..

OH why is heaven built so far,

Oh why is earth set so remote?

I cannot reach the nearest star

That hangs afloat.

I would not care to reach the moon,

One round monotonous of change;

Yet even she repeats her tune

Beyond my range.

I never watch the scatter'd fire

Of stars, or sun's far-trailing train,

But all my heart is one desire,

And all in vain:

For I am bound with fleshly bands,

Joy, beauty, lie beyond my scope;

I strain my heart, I stretch my hands,

And catch at hope.

Note: The files below have been revised.

De Profundis.MID

De Profundis PDF.pdf

De Profundis.MUS

I'll start with the overall and the positive:

Nicely written/harmonized throughout, and you seem to have a knack for matching musical ideas with the ideas/mood of the poem, such as having "joy" be on a major chord after a piece written in minor, or having "mon-ot-on-ous" be the same chord repeated over and over. Well done in that area.

However there are a bunch of mistakes that seem to muddle up the score:

Measure 7: The bass and tenor do not need a tied note since they are changing syllables. Change that to two separate notes. Besides, if it were tied, wouldn't it be a half note? Precisely.

Measure 14: The way you've written "moon" is confusing as crap. "Moon" is monosyllabic, thus, just write the whole word under the first note, and have the underscore type line stretch under the others (like you do in measure 24 for the word "I") and put a slur under those notes - trust me, the choir will by default hold the vowel sound, not the "n" sound.

Measure 21: In the alto, you wrote "he tune" instead of "her tune"

Measure 22: It's odd and not advisable to have voices say only the latter half of a word, like "yond" here. Somehow you need to have the whole of "be-yond" or pick another part of the phrase for those voices to start on.

Measure 30: again, "heart" is monosyllabic, so don't split it up, unless of course you really want the altos to say "he art"

Measure 32: Same thing with "in"

Measure 33: Same thing with "vain"

Measure 41: Again, no need to tie the notes since they're different syllables.

Measure 46: Same thing with "hands"

Measure 47: Same thing with "at"

So yeah - basically the score just needs a lot of work, but the musical ideas are all fine.

The lyrics are nice, and the tune is nice. Its dark and beautiful, reminds me of an old church with the roman architecture and stuff. around 2:50 stuck out where it has a sort of major resolve for a second. Over all I liked it, although I know nothing of choir.

I'll start with the overall and the positive:

Nicely written/harmonized throughout, and you seem to have a knack for matching musical ideas with the ideas/mood of the poem, such as having "joy" be on a major chord after a piece written in minor, or having "mon-ot-on-ous" be the same chord repeated over and over. Well done in that area.

However there are a bunch of mistakes that seem to muddle up the score:

Measure 7: The bass and tenor do not need a tied note since they are changing syllables. Change that to two separate notes. Besides, if it were tied, wouldn't it be a half note? Precisely.

Measure 14: The way you've written "moon" is confusing as crap. "Moon" is monosyllabic, thus, just write the whole word under the first note, and have the underscore type line stretch under the others (like you do in measure 24 for the word "I") and put a slur under those notes - trust me, the choir will by default hold the vowel sound, not the "n" sound.

Measure 21: In the alto, you wrote "he tune" instead of "her tune"

Measure 22: It's odd and not advisable to have voices say only the latter half of a word, like "yond" here. Somehow you need to have the whole of "be-yond" or pick another part of the phrase for those voices to start on.

Measure 30: again, "heart" is monosyllabic, so don't split it up, unless of course you really want the altos to say "he art"

Measure 32: Same thing with "in"

Measure 33: Same thing with "vain"

Measure 41: Again, no need to tie the notes since they're different syllables.

Measure 46: Same thing with "hands"

Measure 47: Same thing with "at"

So yeah - basically the score just needs a lot of work, but the musical ideas are all fine.

Thanks for your input. I wasn't quite sure on how two correlate the words especially monosyllabic words over a few notes. Thanks for the help because I just kinda guessed on what to do with the text and now I know:).

I updated the score I believe I corrected the mistakes I made in the score.

The lyrics are nice, and the tune is nice. Its dark and beautiful, reminds me of an old church with the roman architecture and stuff. around 2:50 stuck out where it has a sort of major resolve for a second. Over all I liked it, although I know nothing of choir.

I am glad you liked it:D

The text at 2:50 is about joy and beauty so thats why its major for just a second.

I just uploaded a PDF version of it for those without finale 08

I really enjoyed listening to it, it sounds like a great start to the piece. Something that I did not like, though, were all of the voice crossings. For the most part, the only voices that really should cross (albeit sparingly) are the alto and tenor, which ironically doesn't happen much. You have quite a few crossings between the bass and the tenor where the bass could easily sing the lower of the pitches. While I could understand why you might do this for reasons of "singability," it will really only make it more confusing to the choir in the end.

Also, the last chord struck me as odd. You endeavored throughout the rest of the piece to keep words like joy and stars on major chords; why not a picardy third for the end? Something about "hope" being on a minor chord there at the end struck me as inconsistent.

Besides that though, an excellent start to the piece; I really enjoyed it.

I really enjoyed listening to it, it sounds like a great start to the piece. Something that I did not like, though, were all of the voice crossings. For the most part, the only voices that really should cross (albeit sparingly) are the alto and tenor, which ironically doesn't happen much. You have quite a few crossings between the bass and the tenor where the bass could easily sing the lower of the pitches. While I could understand why you might do this for reasons of "singability," it will really only make it more confusing to the choir in the end.

Also, the last chord struck me as odd. You endeavored throughout the rest of the piece to keep words like joy and stars on major chords; why not a picardy third for the end? Something about "hope" being on a minor chord there at the end struck me as inconsistent.

Besides that though, an excellent start to the piece; I really enjoyed it.

I am glad you liked it. I am glad you pointed out the flaws in the voice crossing it didnt even notice those ill be sure to fix them. I will take into consideration the picardy chord I think i was planing on doing that but I forgot. :)

Its a nice piece. I mean some nice chords, and i was kinda into it in the beginning, but I got bored like half way through. It was a very typical way to write for chorus which is not a problem, I think it was the fact that the harmonic language kinda stayed constant, I would've liked to see some new chords come out. I dont say you have to do CRAZY stuff, but something new than what you've already done. I mean the text is so great, i feel a lot more could be done with it. Rule number one with vocal music, don't set a text if you arnt going to add anything to it. :)

Score clean up is also needed, make sure you have whole rests and what not, and adjust the format of the score so the last page isnt one measure. I dont know how to fix this on finale.

Overall nice, its a good start as Matthew was saying. Keep working. :)

Scott.

Its a nice piece. I mean some nice chords, and i was kinda into it in the beginning, but I got bored like half way through. It was a very typical way to write for chorus which is not a problem, I think it was the fact that the harmonic language kinda stayed constant, I would've liked to see some new chords come out. I dont say you have to do CRAZY stuff, but something new than what you've already done. I mean the text is so great, i feel a lot more could be done with it. Rule number one with vocal music, don't set a text if you arnt going to add anything to it. :)

Score clean up is also needed, make sure you have whole rests and what not, and adjust the format of the score so the last page isnt one measure. I dont know how to fix this on finale.

Overall nice, its a good start as Matthew was saying. Keep working. :)

Scott.

Thanks a lot! I am pretty inexperienced as a composer (as you can probably tell) and and still learning the ropes so your input is very helpful:). I'll try playing around with some new chords. I do understand that it gets boring in the middle.. I'll keep working on it. Thanks for your input!

OK I revised parts of the songs and redid the ending. I am not sure if the ending works but I was really trying to end on a happy note (literally speaking).

Please comment!!!:thumbsup:

De Profundis.MUS

De Profundis.MID

I quite like it, but as I'm not really that good at commenting things in depth, I'll say the overall thing.

What style is this supposed to be? It isn't supposed to be old-ish style right? If that is the case, then you should definitely go for a more adventurous harmony at least at a point in the music, go nuts.

If it's supposed to be baroque-like or Renaissance counterpoint like, then there are waaay too many mistakes, even on the fourth bar I think.

But I believe it's not supposed to be Renaissance-like so it's okay.

One thing that is lacking that makes this piece sounds slightly more amateurish is the fact that there is no suspension/resolution. Suspensions and resolutions work GREATLY with this type of music. The more dissonance (and resolution) the better!

And yeah, tierce di picardie is definitely cool at the end.

Overall, great work! Write more choral stuff!

I heard the counterpoint errors as errors, because they halted the flow of the music. That, I think, is mostly what this piece needs work on. The flow is jagged and very very slow. The same harmonies occur again and again, which makes it feel repetitive and slightly unnecessary. Adding some shorter note values will allow you to pass through non-chord tones, adding pace, harmonic interest, and singability to the piece.

Your sopranos will hate you, because the majority of their part sits in their passaggio, the hardest part of the voice to sing in. The altos might hate you, but they can handle the Eb.

It shows a good start, but still needs some hefty reworking to keep an audience interested.

Thank you so much for listening to my piece, and for the great feedback. I agree it needs some reworking to make it interesting, I didn't really know much about counterpoint and harmony when i wrote this. I am working on a choral piece right now that I think is much more interesting than this one, once I am finished I'll come back to this one and hammer things out.

If you liked counterpoints and you want to learn. It's good to try and get some counterpoint book and stuff. Species counterpoint would be a great way to start as it starts you off from first species, etc. up to the 5th species and then abandoning Cantus Firmus.

However, most species counterpoint books would be in modal counterpoint, which is good but a bit hard I think, heaps of rules!