Masquerade and Fireworks

Since that damn competition is never going to end, I'll just post this here.

This is the intrumental version of the beginning of Scene II, Act I, of an operetta I've been composing.

Basically, it's a big masquerade ball, a party, with lots of movement, colour and fireworks.

It starts off as if we were getting near the party, and then it's like if the two doors of the mansion opened up in front of you to reveal the commotion.

mp3

Score

Yay. Wonderfully festive and serves the title perfectly. Wonderful orchestration too, in some aspects even more enjoyable than the one in, say, the funeral march. I feel that the little flat in the melody around 2:13 adds a lot to the mood of it, for some reason.

Like you said, the ending is somewhat (Hector) Berliozian.

well done, I think it fits what you were trying to portray very well.

I haven't looked at the score, but it sounds well put together.

:thumbsup:

cool msuic

and very funny music

dark@@

I love the energy buildup in this piece! When can we attend the premiere? :P

You've done one small glitch. The measures 237 - 240 take the oboes down to an F3. That's impossible, the lowest note you can get on an oboe is a Bb3.

Great piece! I think it really captures the mood you were aiming for! I also love your use of dialogue and chromaticism! Highly recommendable! I'm interested to hear one of your scenes which makes use of the voice, as it could change my mind about opera in English.

I'm curious, though, as to why you didn't show all the instruments on the first page of the score before optimizing it as you did in your Love Scene.

I'll admit I didn't take a very detailed look at the score, but rather browsed through it. I noticed a couple of things that, from a mechanic point of view, could be changed in order to make a more professional (and less messy!) looking score:

1. Your rests don't seem to be very consistent. This isn't a major problem rather than something I noticed and "Hmmmm"-ed at! You seem to jump from using, in either the first or second half of the measure; obviously, 3 quaver rests, to a crotchet rest and a quaver rest, to a dotted crotchet rest. This doesn't neccessarily need to be changed, but I'm not certain that you did it intentionally, and if you didn't notice it before it has now been called to your attention!

2. The cuivr

Yes, all of those are merely things from a dirty score. I'm perfectly aware of them. But since it will all have to be slightly modified and rearranged, I leave score cleaning for the last! :happy:

Anyway, this actually used voice, I just made an instrumental, removing the choir staves and adding some instruments to replace some melodies.

I don't think I'll be posting vocal lines around here until the whole thing is done, though. :P

This was good.

I've not much to say, except:

I liked the modulation on page 23;

The ending perhaps could have done with a bit more of a bang;

Maybe the brass could have been featured a bit more.

The orchestration was good...musical material perhaps relied a bit too much on quaver arpeggios. I'd like to see a bit more 'serious' stuff from you once in a while ... a lot of your music is jocose, and quirky, and I'd like to see you moving beyond that, because you certainly have good ideas, and certainly competent orchestration.

Good work.

Heh, thanks, but you don't consider the funeral march to be serious? :P

Of course you have several serious pieces, but I'd like your principal style in which you compose to lose a bit of the 'Disney'.

Disney? :P

Wow, that's an insult! xD

Well it's a comical operetta, so... If I lose the quirky side on this one it kinda misses the point.

I don't think my Barbaric Scherzo (which is quirky) sounds 'Disney'. :P

In fairness, this is an comic opera, I believe. It's light in terms of music by definition, so I would argue that the "Disney" effect has a place here.

Yes, I just cleared it up, I thought he meant cheesy Disney. :P

Silly 'Disney', of course, I actually like some! xD

Oh! And I just realised! To contradict the cuivr

Thanks for that "ord" thing! xD

I disagree on the keeping clean while I write, because sometimes ideas flow so fast the mere fact that you have to write them is already frustratingly slow!

it look like berlioz for me

YouTube - Berlioz, Roman Carnival Overture, op. 9

Berlioz, Roman Carnival Overture, op. 9

look like this one

dark@@

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand you nailed it!!

You have just won 5000 buckets of raw fish!

Yeah, of course I got inspired by that, especially for the ending. But I still think it's far enough from it not to be too obvious.

hahaha ,,, great

you are great

Great stuff! The Force is strong with the one... a powerful Sith you will become. Henceforth... you shall be known as... Darth... Berlioz!!! :D

I enjoyed this piece and it demonstrates a fair level of flair for composition. Somehow I found the whole piece to be a little bit empty and the treatment of the bass is quite dull, the opening especially grated on me. I find some of the textures to be effective and the piece has quite a character - the title is very apt.

Overall I find the whole piece to be a bit conservative and slightly empty, and I hear nothing really that speaks to me as it being "your" work but perhaps I should listen to your other pieces.

Well, you asked that I comment in the thread so here you go.

Heheh. This is an instrumental of a scene that has choir in it. If the opera that contains it is ever performed, I think the choir will fill most of the emptiness.

This kinda like a scherzo you know! You dont get the feeling of an overture, but more like the beginning og a disneyfilm or some cartoon.

you have that upbeat thing like you do in most of your scherzo, maby thats why its seem like a scherzo? i dont know.

You got nice peaks, and ummm...interesting orchestration;)

Good work, as allways!