Trio sonata for organ in g major

I recently bought some nice pipe organ sounds for Logic, this is my first serious try to use them in a peice, it's a trio sonata inspired by Bachs trio sonatas for organ.

Trio_sonata_1.mp3

Trio_sonata_1.midi (basic piano sound though.)

I don't have notes as I don't use notation for composing, but the midi file shows the piano roll which is what I use.

i really liked this piece and also the soundfont you used, even if i must say that if the beginning was very nice, by the end of the piece i felt a little like if you kind of lost the way from where you were coming from. hope i made sense! :)

anyway i like this piece, and hope to hear more from you, and since this is "trio snata 1" hope there are some more of them, is that right??

Yeah I think I do, it's a problem I usually have, I tend to get lost and take the melody somehwere else.

There will indeed be more, I will try to hold the melody on one path the next time :) Thanks for the input!

i really hope you do, it was a nice pice... but for a side, who cares if it looks like you have lost the path a little bit. it is more free from that static setting of following a defined structure. it gives a more improvvisatory look. and listening to it a couple of times is better than just once and bye bye, no?? :)

True, I can just call it a progressive trio sonata ;), still something to train on though, I guess you need to hear it a few times since the melody takes a few weird turns so yeah, listening to it a couple of times is certainly better than once :)

I'm glad you liked it!

Is it just me, or is this a fugue and not a trio sonata?

More or less, I don't know if it can be called a fugue or not, but a trio sonata can just as well be a fugue? I'm not really that good with music theory so I'm just guessing.

I really liked this piece. I can see now why you would tell me about emotional consistency. This doesn't deviate in such a way, like mine does. Sure, there are episodes where the subject isn't heard but you managed to help it add to the overall character of the piece (rather than amounting to an almost trivial distraction as in mine).

There is one thing I notice, however (and perhaps may be why you title this a sonata and not a fugue). You could totally get away with using your subject more like the fugue (the only thing it doesn't do is reiterate on the dominant, and for E minor that's B). The subject did require some modifications however to keep it in the same key. The only tricky part about this is not making a literal transposition of the original subject to B (the first two notes you strike are the tonic and the dominant. it establishes the relationship to it's key every time you hear it).

I had a problem like this one of the subjects in my triple fugue. I couldn't state that subject starting on the dominant without actually modulating TO it, so I was forced to use the mediant instead (A#) as the starting place.

Anyway, I saw that you use a piano roll so I'm uploading an image of your subject modified to start on the dominant. To prevent it from invoking B minor itself (if I had hit F# instead) I had to move the second note up slightly, to G. I'd be very interested to see what you using this would make your piece sound like.

There are no rules about the necessary order of things. What you have done so far is do iterations of Subject, Subject, Subject. Now that you have an answer you can use you can vary that order any way which pleases you (even a regular S, A, S, A).

*shrugs* of course its up to you if you want to go through the effort. It's never pleasant to have to do things over again.

Tobias

Losing your way doesn't always have to be a bad thing.

This one does seem to get off track, but not so far as to become a mess.

It does however become a tad predictable.

Still a nice little piece

Ron

Anilikos: I'm actually terrible at music theory but i asked my dad what you where talking about and he explained it, I didn't know which tone was the dominant before but now I know it's the fifth so I will try to read up some more on this and take it into account the next time I make something fugue-like. Perhaps modify this peice as well.

Thanks a lot for a very thorough review!

rolifer: No I know, but I'm trying to master the art of creating a polyfonic melody(ies) with consistency and variation, it's hard, but fun :), thanks.

If youre going to attempt a sonata for organ in the style of Bach it needs to follow certain strict guidlines....

A clear cut KEY

Modulations that are logical in THE HIGHEST RESPECTS

at LEAST 3 movements

SOME SORT of fugal material-even a fughetta would be feasible

Keep attempting in the art of writing for organ!...i'm living proof that if you work hard enough in this genre you can create MASTERWORKS!...

R.W.M.

Jupiter41: I have not made any claim for this peice of music to be in the style of Bach, I was inspired to create it from listening to Bachs trio sonatas and that's a very different thing. So please read posts more carefully before you start dictating what a musical piece needs.

Fine little piece. Continue on this way but try to compose on paper, it will be benefit for you and your skills.

PS : I think Jupiter comes from the Time Machine : he's an Alien (Mozart's Mutant)

Thanks Raphael, What are the benefits of composing on paper? I kind of like the piano roll, it's like the keyboard very logical :)

haha at "PS"

I recently bought some nice pipe organ sounds for Logic, this is my first serious try to use them in a peice, it's a trio sonata inspired by Bachs trio sonatas for organ.

Trio_sonata_1.mp3

Trio_sonata_1.midi (basic piano sound though.)

I don't have notes as I don't use notation for composing, but the midi file shows the piano roll which is what I use.

This very interinting for contamination between past and present, too compose elements with modern and ancient

More or less, I don't know if it can be called a fugue or not, but a trio sonata can just as well be a fugue? I'm not really that good with music theory so I'm just guessing.

?!!

What the hell?!

Fugue - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Trio sonata - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

M_is_D: Could you please elaborate on that?

M_is_D: Could you please elaborate on that?

Yes.

They're different.

LOL

You don't have to be all smirky about it, I phrased it as a question since I'm a n00b at this, but I still don't understand why a trio sonata couldn't be a fugue? a fugue can be percieved as a texture and since the trio sonata has three voices it's no stopping it for being a fugue? Having that said, of course my organ work here isn't a real fugue.

Here, let's compare:

YouTube - Dietrich Buxtehude - Op. 1 No. 4 <----------------------- Trio Sonata

YouTube - Arcangelo Corelli - Sonata in G, Op.1

YouTube - Vivaldi - Trio Sonata in D Minor "La Folia" RV63

YouTube - Mozart Trio for Clarinet Viola and Piano 'Kegelstatt' (1/3)

YouTube - J.S.Bach - Trio Sonata No.2 in C minor, Vivace (BWV 526a)

YouTube - J. S. Bach Trio Sonata 3th. Movement

YouTube - Duo Piano Mozart Fugue

http://www.youngcomposers.com/forum/trio-sonata-organ-g-major-16481-3.html#post258239

I cannot listen to this piece yet (no sound here at school), but I think I can address the theory question that you didn't get answered. (The idea of this forum is to be supportive and helpful, yeah?)

A Trio Sonata is a piece in Sonata form for two melodic instruments and a basso continuo. This means threes lines of melody, the bottom of which is for unspecified instrumentation. Two violins and basso continuo, or two flutes and BC, are quite common instumentations (Flute, Bassoon and BC is quite nice too!).

A fugue is... a large fughetta? Haha it's a bit hard to define. A fugue is a specific type of contrapuntal composition.

The fugue is a form which takes a main melodic theme (the Subject) and develops it polyphonically.

I have to run to make a rehearsal, but for now look at the wikipedia entry, it's not bad. Fugue - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

And PS don't worry about the lack of theory knowledge. Everyone starts out not knowing theory. But I would suggest that you study theory, preferably in a class situation (most community colleges have theory courses, for example), before attempting to compose a fugue. The fugue is one of the most difficult forms to master (I still struggle with it), and is kind of a right-of-passage for the composer, to be able to compose his first fugue.

Best of luck with your compositions!

Tobias -

First I applaud you for venturing to write a Trio Sonata movement. You chose a fantastic model - the Trio Sonatas of Bach. But you chose probably one of the most difficult compositional forms and one of the best executions of them. Post graduate level composers struggle to write trio sonatas with the clarity Bach did.

One things I think you do require is some basic studies in counterpoint. Yes, I mention this often -- but I am a firm believer in this. Sixteenth century plaestrina-like counterpoint is an excellent foundation and requires only knowing your intervals, and ability to read bass and treble clefs (sometimes C clefs but don't worry about this one for now).

So my first question - do you know your intervals and scales? Are you able to read treble (G clefs) and bass ( F clef) clefs?

Lastly, writing as you do has its benefits - your aural skills are strengthened over time and it can be easier to think "outside the box" for an instrument. Yet writing with paper or notation has its benefits too as you get a visual idea of your sound and learn new ways to solve compositional problems. Also, learning notation helps you keep better track of your ideas, especially when writing larger forms.

I still don't understand why a trio sonata couldn't be a fugue? a fugue can be percieved as a texture and since the trio sonata has three voices it's no stopping it for being a fugue? Having that said, of course my organ work here isn't a real fugue.

A trio sonata can have a fugue in it, but a fugue is not necessarily a trio sonata.....