A Clear Midnight (Final Version)

Although the PDF score did not work properly for me I took a listen and I thoroughly enjoyed what I heard. Good luck in getting it properly performed.

:) Thank you very much.

I respect you wonderfully as a composer, Morivou. :)

I respect you wonderfully as a composer, Morivou. :)

*tears up, no joke* Thank you so much! That means the world to me. You have no idea. I am crying over here. :)

I wanna hear your music now! *goes to search "whateverfin"'s music.*

Morivou -

First off, bravo on setting these texts to music to create a whole and exploring some new areas of your harmonic and rhythmic language. Also, I sould love to hear this live just to hear all the wonderful wordplay created by your unusual scansion in some places. Honestly, though, I found this work a little on the timid side - as if as soon as you ventured into new territory you retreated into safer habits - not that you did this consciously but rather you seem to see your old harmonic world as a way to achieve resolution from dissonance. And it makes sense, but to me it sounds more like you are in between two wrolds stylistically. This is fine as you know but I wanted to let you know this to prepare you for such a reaction. My assessment must be taken with a grain of salt as I need to hear a live performance. I hope you get a performance and recording soon. Except for one spot in Innisfree,where you have the text divided between the bass and the spacing could be a tiny bit better to show bass 1 and bass 2, the score looks good.

Additional comments:

I especially second Chris's earlier comments as I agree the connection between the pieces could be much stronger. A good example is from the Clear Midnight to Innisfree. Except for occasional harmonies referenced between the two they stand either as two separate pieces or complementary ones - but they don't seem interwoven. I think it is simplify you have an abundance of melodic ideas which you try to connect these two with your distribution of voices (for example, having the lower voices left holding lowers notes of a cadence in Clear serves as a faint foreshadowing of the countrapuntal opening of Innisfree between the bass and tenor). I find the harmonic language far more interesting in Clear but Innisfree more unified? Why? As Chris said, you do such a good job most of the time having the music reflect the text with your word painting in Clear Midnight (and you do it well with Innisfree) that you allow the overall form of the piece to sound more episodic. I am unsure if you want that. Also, I love some of your rhythmic divisions of the text - the alternation of 4 against 3 and switching from the half note to an uneven 3 against 2 as well as having a 3/4 meter followed by a 5/8 to unsteady the pulse and make the music sound more "human" (eg imperfectly rhythmic) is wonderful. In fact in Innissfree, the "shore" accompaniment figure does this too but could have gone farther by creating rhythms via textures - eg. superimposing a steadier pulse against a regular pulse between two voices, rather than just slurring it every 3 beats in a 4 beat bar.

The one place where the individual pieces show a lack of connectedness especially is with the Langston poem - you incorporate often used characteristics of the spiritual and adapt them to your purpose but I don't feel you go far enough. Due the text's brevity , you could have done more interesting things with text overlapping, vowel displacements and even played with the call and response formula more.

Anyway these are small things to consider for your next multimovemetn choral piece. It is hard enough to write a cohesive multi movement instrumental piece - a choral piece based not on the Ordinary or High mass is setting the difficulties much higher - so props to you on that.

mmm. I agree with all of your comments. And, that's the next thing I am working on! I feel like I am ahead of the game, being as I am only 17 and I am in High School. So, I know VERY well the need to improve my voice and to find my voice. I mean, to be honest, there is NO composer (nowadays and who is normal) who HAS a fully developed voice or knows how to use it well at my age.

As for the timid stuff, I agree. The music itself was not as "ambitious" as I had hoped in the end. What I may end up doing is separate them... not keep them as a "cycle" per se. Even though they are bonded by idea, that wasn't enough to bind them musically. I need to be more creative and try to explore NEW areas that I haven't ventured into yet. However, I am not sure where that Harmonic language lies or WHERE to find it. I mean, listening to literature helps, I guess... but at this point, I don't know how much further Harmonically I can go because I don't know where to start looking.

As for the "abundance of melodic ideas"... I have a case of ADD. lol. So, I tend to jump around sometimes. That's not excuse, but it's a truism I have learned. I need to be extra careful in how I connect my ideas. I, in all honesty, didn't find the piece to be "segmented" as much as it was episodic. Which, in truth, I am ok with for that composition. Obviously, it's not where I want to GO. But, in retrospect, it was alright.

Thanks for the "human" comment... mostly because that is what I STRIVE for more than anything. To make the music like a human speech pattern would be in music... because humans are not perfect, so neither should the "rhythm". To me, that's kind of pompous to assume an idea in perfect 4/4. But, that's just me... Now, obviously, don't go tell Mozart I said that. haha.

AS for the Langston poem... I will be blunt here. I composed this piece as almost a musical "sentence". It was a Ricky Ian Gordon setting I heard, and I wanted to incorporate it into the cycle I was working on. I loved the words so much... I didn't really want much of a development. I mean, think about it. That setting didn't have any change in emotion or change in text. It is only a sentence and a statement of fact. And, all I wanted it to be was a statement of fact. Now, obviously, did I go further with that idea? YEAH. But, should I have developed it more... I don't really think so. I see it more of an interlude. Just a small interjection. On the flip side, I could have taken a "developed" point of view... I chose not to. Will I ever choose that again? Maybe not. Maybe I will. I just DID something different. And, obviously, some people like it and some don't.

Thanks for the props! I worked hard on it. And, I am already working on a new one (see my latest work in the Choral/Vocal section if you haven't already). But, that one is to get me ready for my opera I am writing. So, not as MUCH thought is going into it. However, it is already using the criticism I have got here so far! :D

So, thanks for the review!

-Morivou.

Well Morivou you are ahead of the game then. And the idea of development of the Langston did not entirely meant in the traditional "metamorphasis" and return (eg the old Hegelian idea) but just a greater sense of willing to play around with the stuff within that sentence. But I agree you didn't need to. The langston works well alone. As Chris Dunn said this could work as a set with a concluding movement that incorporates snippets of the most important text(in your estimation) to form something like an oriental tapestry - that is different repeating designs coalesce to form a larger more complete one.

And yes you are quite mature for 17 --- but i know there is a bit of silliness and immaturity somewhere in you. I think everyone never really becomes "mature" in all aspects of themselves.

Well, I think a part of me will ALWAYS be immature and silly. But, where's the fun in life without it? A lot of my music has that playfulness that many people like in me. I think it brings some life to the table. But, I am also trying to learn to put aside that "attitude of youth" and make a strong transition to be ABLE to handle the more serious works.

For instance, I won't be writing a Mass anytime soon, because at my current stage in life, how could I possibly put the emotional and musical thought into something so serious? And as to your "expansion of Harmonic Language" idea... how would I go about doing that? What should I experiment with?

Several ideas

Write a progression based entirely on chords with added 2nds and 4ths as the "consonant" chords and tertial chords - eg triads, 7ths, 9ths in root position as the "dissonant" chords. Or try dissonant counterpoint wherein you reverse the rules of traditional counterpoint. Do an exercise or two of such counterpoint and then see what you can build from it. To hear an example of dissonance counterpoint check Ruggles Evocations piano piece I posted in the Suggest A Work forum.

Also, the rug idea - see what harmony arises from a texture of irregularly recurring melodic strands and then see what harmony develops from taking one long phrase and applying the rhythmic treatment you did to make more human. Eg, what harmonies would you get if you took a gigantic melodic phrase, individualized each with your rhythmic treatment, and then as if it were a choral of strong personalities have them sound together.

To create long melodic chains and derive shorter ones see the example below:

Initial melodic phrase is generated through adding recurring units to an intial unit (in this case initial unit is 14623)

1 4 6 2 3 3 2 6 2 6 4 1 - 1=1/2 step, 2= whole step, 3 = whole plus 1/2 step ... etc

If you want to get more detailed you can use + or - to indicate direction. From this "chain" you can derive smaller melodic units or larger ones.

So you can have 62321 as a shorter unit, and 1462332641423 as a larger one.

Naturally I recommend you sing/play these melodic units and adjust them according to your ear so you aren't tied down by numbers. Also, say you create a canon of 2 or 3 voices - just concern yourself about the starting points of the entrances THEN go through it and use your ear to fix any counterpoint that sounds awkward to your ears.

Cool! I will try this stuff out.

Can a choir pull those harmonies off? I'm sure a professional group could but you've got some difficult (although wonderfully written) suspensions in the first mvt.

In my experience, you can teach a choir to do almost anything. Maybe not on a first reading. But, yes, it should be allllll possible.

Morivou-

What a great set of pieces! You should be proud.

You were right, the Whitman setting is a different interpretation than my setting for tenor; however, I think it is extremely effective. Lots of crunchy diatonic harmonies, which I am a fan of.

For me, the standout piece was "Innsfree." What I liked about it was that it felt slow and reflective, yet it still had forward motion. It didn't feel stagnant, which is sometimes a difficult thing to avoid in a slow piece. One specific element I liked was your use of the dotted eighth note pattern (4 in a row). It provided a different kind of motion that I felt was a good touch. I am a sucker for chorales, and enjoyed the "nationalistic" section. It actually gave me chills! Yes, this MIDI recording gave me chills... haha.

The third movement works well also. It expresses a thought, and doesn't ramble on for a long time. Nice job.

I would love to hear this performed live! Excellent work.

Hornet

:D Thank you!! I just... I just DON'T know how to get any of this performed live. Who can I send it to?

Maybe a local college or university choir? I don't know. Where I go to school, the choirs are usually more than willing to perform new music, even from non-students.

Just a thought.

But, I am 17, see. ;)