Ave Maria

EDIT:

I've sent the choir the final version of it (with the piano accompaniment).

Score FINAL

MIDI FINAL

Hey guys,

I composed this piece for a performance of our uni and I'm wondering if you guys can give me some input on the composition. It's kind of boring, well it is really boring. The text I chose is Ave Maria (not that there isn't enough Ave Maria settings already).

But yeah, anyway, these are the files.

Score

MIDI

ST

This is not boring!! I am a sucker for this kinda choral music. There are some parts that sound very much like Eric Whitacre like when you have the peddle tone G in the first soprano part, I heard a lot of "sleep" and a "boy and a girl" if you are familiar with his compositions. I really liked this piece, but the one thing I didn't understand was the ending. It might throw off your listeners and leave them confused (it may just be the bad midi voices), but thats your intent then more power to you.

Ah, thanks! Yeah, of course I know Eric Whitacre. I haven't listened to his music in ages though. So these references must have been there because I was familiar to his music =P

Absolutely, I love Sleep! A Boy and A Girl too!

Yeah, I kinda am feeling weird about the ending too. But it might be different with singers. I'll ask other people's opinions too! But thanks for confirming my doubts about the ending =P

I really enjoyed the piece...you have some wonderful ideas, and I loved a lot of things in this piece (the Jesu Christe, was beautiful in my opinion...all that consonance after the overlapping "fructus ventris tuis" was a perfect catharsis).

One thing, the word is mulieribus if I'm not mistaken, a small thing, but you need to add a syllable of text.

As for the ending...I may not be the best person to discuss this, my endings leave something to be desired, but I think your ending at 63 was fine, no need to extend it. It seemed to me that you just tacked on the last few measures after it, in order to return to a certain tonal area, but I don't think you need to do that.

Agree with revising the ending - it sounds as if the piece is continuing rather than coming to an end. But don't alter the rest! This was actually rather better than a great deal of the choral music we see around here, well-written parts (and a clear score too), sensible writing range-wise, fairly assured technique in building and relaxing tension. I didn't think it sounded overly derivative of His Majesty Eric Whitacre either, I could hear Vaughan Williams, Gorecki (particularly his Totus Tuus in the 'Maria' bit) and renaissance music in there too. If I may be permitted to give you a little compositional 'push' so to speak, I think you should develop the independence of the lines in your choral writing. The voices all tended to have the same rhythm most of the time, and where they became a little freer you seemed to rein them in again after a short time. This will improve the momentum of the music. Also perhaps I could suggest that, taking the performance acoustic into consideration, the tempo be brought up a little? It was very slow and at times I feared for the MIDI singers' circulation...

Oh, and don't be tempted to imitate Whitacre too much, partly because he's not that outstanding a composer but mostly because the world and his wife are doing it.

Thank's guys! I appreciate the comments.

Ah yes, it is "mulieribus"... I actually typed mulieribus on the text on the title page. But yeah, somehow set mulierbus instead. But I've changed it so it's got the missing syllable now.

About it sounding like Monsieur Whitacre, I wasn't actually trying to do what he does. Or if it was there, maybe is because I like some of his harmonies, etc. (I like his music, but only to a certain extent).

But I absolutely adore Gor

Oh, and don't be tempted to imitate Whitacre too much, partly because he's not that outstanding a composer but mostly because the world and his wife are doing it.

I concur. Adding to this: he devotes entire blogposts to chocolate and to iPod shufflequizzes and is generally a teenage girl.

(I'm sorry, I'm awful, I just had to say that. Feedback on piece coming soon.)

I concur. Adding to this: he devotes entire blogposts to chocolate and to iPod shufflequizzes and is generally a teenage girl.

(I'm sorry, I'm awful, I just had to say that. Feedback on piece coming soon.)

sooo true!!!

lol, I don't read his blog, although I skimmed through it to find some free music to download xD

But yeah, some of my blogposts are crap too though =(

I can't wait to get this tried out on Friday =P I'll show this to my composition teacher tomorrow.

Well, I've made some revisions and here's what I hope the final version is going to be.

Download files here

This obviously could still change depending on my feelings and the feedbacks I get from you guys.

I added a short solo at the amen and changed it slightly.

I really loved the fragments in the beginning. The chords were gorgeous, and although I would have taken them in completely different directions, just leading me on is good enough.

I also really liked the final chord. I would definitely keep it, but cut the resolution of the Alto II's have them sustain the D instead. And if you do decide to change the ending completely, I'd just keep the chord for future use because it's really pretty. It did catch me off-gaurd, but so did half the resolutions of this piece (which isn't a bad thing), so I guess ending with a non-active chord would be in good taste too.

Nothing about this piece reminded me of Whitacre.

Yeah, we are different people after all :D

Hmm, yeah, I was thinking of that too, I'm wondering how it would sound like this and I'll get the choir to keep the D too when I go for their first "workshop/rehearsal" this 19th :D

And I'm glad nothing reminds this of Whitacre =P

the piece is interesting for the use the particular chord

I seem to see the mountains

Particular chords? Mountains? Erm... I'm not sure I understand what you mean by that T_T

the harmony is interesting for used the dissonance chord

than, with choir , are smoothed