Act of Contrition by Benj Cramer

I had a few rehearsals and made some big changes. I haven't worked out the text for the middle, so that is why it is blank.

Enjoy, any feedback would be nice.

~Benj

Act of Contrition.MUS

Act of Contrition 2.pdf

I really enjoyed this. A lot of your chord progressions are quite nice, and very lush, but it also plays well with the lyrics. Speaking of lyrics, you have accents set very well, on the right beats, so the beat doesn't give accent to an unaccented syllable, and whatnot. Very well placed.

One thing that bothered me was the 1st section in general, but specifically the (ooooh) intro. More specifically, the continuous F against E clashes. Sop/alt on the last beat of mm 2. Sop/Bass on the last beat of 3. Also, the Bb against A clash in the Altos/Tenors (with passing help from the sop.) If these are absolutely intentional, and necessary for the piece, then by all means. But they don't seem to need to be there, nor fit much. I'm a huge gunner for dissonance, don't get me wrong, but if you didn't intentionally put things that way, then it might work better with something else.

May I take a guess that you enjoyed writing the middle and End of this piece more than the beginning. It seems that the further the piece goes, the better it is written, and by the end, (all in my opinion of course) you are writing some extremely good choral music. This beginning is in no way a reflection of the end, and as a listener, I went in on the wrong foot because of a few sour clashes that I thought might not need be. I actually went through a second time, listening for more obvious clashes, and there were none that really stood out to me. Lots of good dissonances and resolutions, all with purpose. Overall, good work. When writing pieces, I usually end completely on a completely different thought process than when I start. And even though sometimes when I finish I want to be done and never see it again unless it's being performed, I will force myself to go back to the beginning and re-analyze my work. Now that I am connected to the piece, and I know where it is going, how can I make a better first step for the listener to get to the end of my piece happily. Just something to consider.

Thank you very much for the feedback!

I did quite enjoy writing the middle and end much more. The entire section without text wasn't originally in the score, it simply jumped that gap and was definitely missing something.

The beginning was my sad attempt at trying to work on my counterpoint. The clashes are intentional, but it's not necessarily the best progression it could be. I will work on it some more and hopefully have a 3.0 up soon enough.

Thanks again for all the feedback!