Death Stands Above Me

Here is another one of my summer choir pieces. For me this piece is only semi-finished in that I have to do a lot of editing before I present this to performers. But before I can really do some editing I need a few more pairs of eyes to look over it. I need some help with mainly spelling certain parts better for easy reading (and when you look at the piece you will see why), structure, and overall flow.

here is a little bit about the piece:

the piece is set to a poem by Walter Landor entitled Death Stands Above Me. The poem is very short and is repeated once through out the piece.

The piece focuses around ambiguity and shifting and multiple tonal centers. It attempts to do this by emphasizing fifths and fourths, parallel motion, invented scales, whole tones scales, modes, and modulations. This piece is intended for an advance choir to professional choir.

Finale 2008 - [Death Stands Above Me.pdf

Well... I guess for what you wanted, and staying true to the text, you have done a wonderful job. My question to you though is this, why so much dissonance that you can't hear the beauty of what the poem is trying to say? In my interpretation, it is almost a small cry for help... not a Maestoso ending saying FEAR IS NOT A WORD... or whatever it says.

I am serious here... to me, you have misread the poem. It should be filled with fear and whispering. I wouldn't have written more than 4 measures above mezzo forte. The text REALLY lends itself to having to listen carefully. Think about it. The death comes whispering low... I wouldn't even make that rhythmic, I would treat it like a soft kitty cat ready to smash it at any moment... but you don't.

Now, keep in mind, this is what I would do... so this may not help you at all. In terms of setting and scoring, you have done well... I just want to make sure you KNOW what you're doing. And, you might... and I might be WAY over my head here... Just, I don't get it and I want to.

One part I LOVED about this setting is the part about the language and not understanding and the WHIRLWIND of sound you create, that was wonderful.

As I am looking back over your .pdf I see some things that I would reconsider form my previous argument. The beginning is good. I think that you have create a nice drive for the beginning, but it doesn't go anywhere... it just takes off into non-melody land. And, sure, that's all fine and dandy, but I think you composed a sectional piece. Which is fine... but maybe then at the beginning, instead of a sense of drive, you could consider a more spacious and fretful introduction. Try lightening the harmonic structure towards the beginning and build up to the fierce dissonance.

Now for the end... it's what I have problems with. I REALLY don't think it should end

1) On a major chord... cause that is anti-tonal to the piece... Picardy thirds are not welcome in pieces about being frightened by death (opinion. lolz) and

2) So loud! Why end it so loud? What was your thought process.

All in all, I enjoyed most of it. I couldn't dig the severe crunchiness though. Sorry.

-Morivou.

I had a feeling that the ending would be the down fall of the piece. For some odd reason I ended the piece like that, mainly just to put an ending for the sake of ending it.

now looking at it I am again stuck on how I really want this to end.

Well, I can't tell you how to end it. But, I would say, you could repeat the end phrase more, and let it descend. Almost like: (ex. Say a person was in pain and was afriad... they might do something like this:) "I NEED HELP..." *falters* "I need... help" "Somebody... help... me" *become fraught with pain and anxiety... fails to a whispers* "(help... me...)"

Something like that could work. you can ignore this if you want. haha.

I somewhat agree with Morivou here. The dissonance is too much for me. Well, not to say to much, but it doesn't fit the text, in my opinion. It seems like it's dissonance for the sake of dissonance, as opposed to having a purpose. Perhaps I just don't understand it.

As far as the individual lines, you've made this very difficult for just about every part. Not only the intervalic jumps, but the relativity and relationship between other parts doesn't help either. Even in the very beginning you have the altos finding their beginning pitch in mm 5 from the D minor chord in the tenor and bass voices. This is not extremely difficult, but in an acapella piece, you certainly want to get going on the right foot, especially a very chromatic piece like this one, a difficult entrance can throw off then entire rest of the piece, if not send it a few cents flat right from the beginning.

Another difficult place is measure 24. Where you take the choir from a B9 chord to a G7 in the next measure, with so many parts moving only by half steps. Especially the altos, with the C# and the D# crunch, they will have trouble splitting the difference and being in perfect unison on the next beat at the D-nat.

Another part I think will cause trouble is the last beat of 37 and into 38. That jump in the 2nd tenors on beat 4 is not only getting to the bottom of their range, making them much weaker in volume, and vocal precision(if they really are tenors), but the tritone jump down, followed by the minor 7 jump up, it will cause trouble every time. If you must have that line, I'd suggest giving the 2nd tenor line to the baritones. This way the A# will be much stronger. What I would do is leave both notes in the tenors and just give the second tenors the top note in the chord, and the 1st tenors the bottom note, an octave up. This way, you have second tenors singing an E-nat to an E# and then to the G# in the next measure(a much easier line to read, and to sing), and your 1st tenors singing and A-natural to an A# and then to the C#, again a much easier line to read, and you have your same chord structure. You could even let the baritones double the first tenors, and you'd have the lower A# to create the line you want. The same happens in mm. 41 in the tenors.

Now, I still don't know how the basses will find their B-natural in the 2nd beat of mm.38, but again, there's lot of issues with line congruence and relationship between parts throughout.

Also, just so you know...the 'r' in "word" is missing in mm. 42 in the soprano line. Tiny thing...

Basically, I think the biggest thing in a piece like this is line relationship between the different parts. Especially in a situation where a part will have to pull a note out of nowhere, you can give the note to someone else so that a section can listen and find their note beforehand. Otherwise, you make it very difficult. Now, I'm not saying it has to be easy to sight read, not at all. But the biggest part of singing in a choir, especially a chamber choir (which is most likely to do this) is listening to every other part. Even in performance, it's all about listening. The thing with choirs, if they practice enough, yes, they can get the jumps, and the random notes out of nowhere, and whatnot, and make it sound great, and to an audience, it will sound exactly the way you want it. But, this will require a lot of time with a piano on the part of the individual choir members, because some of the jumps just aren't natural, so they will need to get it into their heads, so it doesn't have to be thought about, they just make the jump, even if it doesn't make sense to their line. Unless you are a choir director somewhere, I doubt enough time can/will be committed to getting your piece to a performance level, or at least acceptable enough to record for your records. Since you probably don't have this much time, you probably want to make it as sight readable as possible, or at least readable after the first few runthroughs with a rehearsal accompanist.

After all that...there are some things I like here. I like the droning bass/tenor at the beginning, and again in the middle/end. It sort of sets up the mood of the piece. I really like the melody line at "death stands above me". It has a haunting sort of a feel to it, like impending dread, completely out of the control of the speaker. I also like the echo of the "whispering low" and the building of the chord. I also very much like the soprano solo in mm. 33. I really wish there was more of it. Or even a descant line somewhere.

May I ask, why so much choral stuff this summer? Just curious...

May I ask, why so much choral stuff this summer? Just curious...

I dont know why really. It just seems to be what I am drawn to writing this summer. I have been experimenting with 5ths and 4ths a lot this summer and choral music seems to fit my needs to experiment more then instrumental music.

Basically, I think the biggest thing in a piece like this is line relationship between the different parts. Especially in a situation where a part will have to pull a note out of nowhere, you can give the note to someone else so that a section can listen and find their note beforehand. Otherwise, you make it very difficult. Now, I'm not saying it has to be easy to sight read, not at all. But the biggest part of singing in a choir, especially a chamber choir (which is most likely to do this) is listening to every other part. Even in performance, it's all about listening. The thing with choirs, if they practice enough, yes, they can get the jumps, and the random notes out of nowhere, and whatnot, and make it sound great, and to an audience, it will sound exactly the way you want it. But, this will require a lot of time with a piano on the part of the individual choir members, because some of the jumps just aren't natural, so they will need to get it into their heads, so it doesn't have to be thought about, they just make the jump, even if it doesn't make sense to their line. Unless you are a choir director somewhere, I doubt enough time can/will be committed to getting your piece to a performance level, or at least acceptable enough to record for your records. Since you probably don't have this much time, you probably want to make it as sight readable as possible, or at least readable after the first few runthroughs with a rehearsal accompanist.

I agree with you on most of this, that is kind of why this piece is still under construction. But on difficulty I would have to disagree in some parts.

While writing this I have kept a certain choir in mind. I know the choir I am currently a part of can not, but the choir that is just above mine can certainly do something like, mainly because they have done music of this difficulty, and of course professional choirs can do this.

i do have to agree with you on one thing, this is not a really sight readable piece right now, (mainly due to some spelling errors I need to iron out) and this piece might never be a sight readable piece. This is virtuosic choral music.

True. As I said, nothing wrong with a difficult piece that isn't sight readable. Just, curious as to whether the choir your will have sing this will be able to get it in a short amount of time. Unless you have all the time you need with them.

True. As I said, nothing wrong with a difficult piece that isn't sight readable. Just, curious as to whether the choir your will have sing this will be able to get it in a short amount of time. Unless you have all the time you need with them.

You underestimate the choirs of texas... My high school choir has sightread pieces like this (Sans the atonalistic approach... but very close, it was a hugely chromatic piece and did FINE on our first reading). Our school is a Grammy award winning high school. And, most high schools in our area are JUST as good as we are, we were just lucky.

College-wise, it just gets better.

Curious on the stat of this piece. I am not a choral expert but a strong choir would get this - there would be tuning traps to watch out for - ensuring the major 2nd and minor 2nds are the right distance and 4ths don't turn into slightly sharp major 3rds or a limpid fifth, but overall this is quite doable.

I agree with Moriovou that the ending is unsatisifying. Some good stuff but your sopranos are either in their passagio or higher and you are asking for mp to f. Honestly, you'll be lucky to get those chords to sound mp as the sound as it is will be huge. Plus it will get pretty tiring to hear those A flats. Bruckner's Te Deum has sections like this but he does offer relief.

Also, the scansion on whispering - as morivou alluded - why not a bit more halting? Try a dotted eight, thirty second, thirty second, dotted eighth. In fact the return of the opening drone would benefit from a bit more halting rhythm - say 5/4 half note to dotted half and have the other voices come in the original rhythm and have the voices eventually align to present the opening rhythm is one possibility.

Now, I love the chords in 31, 54 especially. And you have some good textures (the opening, some of the imitation, the wonderful arpeggio in the bass part) but as a whole it sounds OK but could either be tightened OR expanded. Another thing is to have more periods of less sound - I was hankering for it. i enjoyed the harmonies but you had so many luscious harmonies (well except one 36 - 43, you repeat the same cadence in similar voicing - this struck me as dull - just moving from a more closed to more open spacing would be far more refreshing) that I wanted a respite (it is like having too many banana split crepes with nuts and cherries!)

there would be tuning traps to watch out for - ensuring the major 2nd and minor 2nds are the right distance and 4ths don't turn into slightly sharp major 3rds or a limpid fifth, but overall this is quite doable.

THIS IS FOR CHORAL MUSIC ONLY.

You would be surprised... 2nds are the easiest intervals to tune. It actually can "keep" a piece in tune, because it's so EASY to hear exactly what the dissonance should sound like. Now, 4ths can be HARDER in a piece with tritones prevalent because the choir is USED to hearing the dissonant quality of the tritone, they tend to go sharp. It would be different if it were a "classical" piece... because 4ths are mainly used in Resolution, which they "commonly" are not in contemporary music LIKE THIS. That being said, tuning issues ACTUALLY have more to do with a style of the piece. Another example would be a major 7th. In Jazz music, it's EASY to tune 7ths because of their prevalence. The choir can HEAR the Jazz chords. Whereas in more classical style music, 7ths can be MUCH more difficult to tune because they aren't used as a settling point (a.k.a. you don't usually see a resolution to a 7th chord in Classical style music as much as you do in Jazz music)...

SOOO, all that was saying was basically that tuning, in choirs at least, has to do MORE with the style of music than the actual intervalic relationship between the notes.

Thanks Morivou. I just find with less experienced and capable choirs that I have accompanied and who feed on a steady diet of Handel, Mozart, Bach, Mendelssohn and maybe some Brahms before going to pop adaptations and more modern "lite" classical pieces, they tend to find it easier to do a major 2nd than a minor 2nd and after awhile they loose their 4th (but as you said, much depends on the style of the piece). This is in keeping with your comment about style - these choirs are used to a very common practice classical music where 4ths resolve down and major 2nds are more common than minor seconds.

So very helpful and I now understand why less able choirs struggle with these things. Pardon if I perpetuated any erroneous info.

Thanks Morivou. I just find with less experienced and capable choirs that I have accompanied and who feed on a steady diet of Handel, Mozart, Bach, Mendelssohn and maybe some Brahms before going to pop adaptations and more modern "lite" classical pieces, they tend to find it easier to do a major 2nd than a minor 2nd and after awhile they loose their 4th (but as you said, much depends on the style of the piece). This is in keeping with your comment about style - these choirs are used to a very common practice classical music where 4ths resolve down and major 2nds are more common than minor seconds.

So very helpful and I now understand why less able choirs struggle with these things. Pardon if I perpetuated any erroneous info.

Why thanks for taking the time to read what I write. I really don't know anything about "orchestral tuning"... I usually just don't worry about it until someone HERE tells me I screwed up. haha.

Hey, not sure if anyone mentioned this yet, but the ladies have no text on page 4. Also, the tenors say "languages" at ms 67.

Speaking of language, I like the harmonic language you're using, but I worry sometimes about the prosody of some phrases. I think you should go through it and see where you can alter the rhythm of some of the words to make them more like natural speaking. But as you said, there's still some clean up left to do.

Can't wait to see the finished product.