Episode #2 for Piano

This a short piece for piano, composed today. The idea behind this piece is to further develop a form that I am experimenting with (tentatively called an Episode). The idea of an episode is to have sections interspersed with contrapuntal or burlesque styled music - where the counterpoint, development, or embellishments occur on the preceding material and its constituents. Let me know what you think.

Episode #2 for Piano

Episode #2 for piano.pdf

:thumbsup: I like where you went with this! Interesting form; good and sturdy (but certainly not boring) use of diatonic soundmass. There are a lot of entertaining figures for the left-hand to play, so I think this will go over well with fellow pianists as well. I hope you don't mind my printing off a copy to play for my own enjoyment. Thanks again for sharing this! :D

Thank you. And thats fine.

I loved your use of contrasting chomatic movement in MM 32 and 33. The chomticisms throughout the entire piece worked very well and sounded very natural.

The parallel octave sixteenth note runs sounded a little thin to me. I would add some depth by at least making it transition to parallel 6ths or 10ths (not the whole time, just for parts of the run to create more drive and forward motion), but thats just my oppinion.

Over all I thought you did a great job. Nice use of counterpoint, and, like kromatozomika said you made it quite entertaining for the pianist as well. Good job!

Thanks! I will test out your suggestion and see if I like it. Glad you enjoyed the piece.

Sounds like a pretty good exercise for finger technique. Other than that, I dunno, it's very very limited in scope both in terms of counterpoint complexity and harmony, specially considering how much repetition there is of the exact same figures without taking them anywhere. Hell, in sections I felt like you were just filling up space with counterpoint-esque motives, which is why I get the impression it should as well be technique etude or something since a lot of the small fast notes seem tacked on just for the sake of having them and none of the motives formed by them are important to the bigger form since you use totally different material for your "themes" during the homophone parts.

All that said, some of it did remind me of Villa-lobos' Bachianas, probably because of the two voices in one typical motive that always shows up.

...specially considering how much repetition there is of the exact same figures....you were just filling up space with counterpoint-esque motives....and none of the motives formed by them are important to the bigger form since you use totally different material for your "themes" during the homophone parts.

All that said, some of it did remind me of Villa-lobos' Bachianas, probably because of the two voices in one typical motive that always shows up.

Well, the repetition isnt really that bad this piece imo. I did do my best to make it interesting to the ear. And no, I wasnt just filling up space with counterpoint-esque motives, if you took the time to look at the score for the piece you will clearly see that wasn't my goal. Aside from one or two scalar runs, all the material is based on two motifs - clearly audible to the ear. (One instance of it is even an outright retrograde of the motif! Another instance, is a variation of 1 note difference!) Thanks for taking the time to listen though, I really appreciate it!

P.S. Did I fail to mention I composed this in like an hour???

Well the reason it seemed to me like that is because there's only so much you can do with a motive before everything starts to sound the same. Even if the areas I thought to be filler were carefully considered or based on motives throughout the piece the actual product, because of the way is presented, does not call attention to this fact specially because the idiom you're using is quite narrow in terms of motive unity.

Well the reason it seemed to me like that is because there's only so much you can do with a motive before everything starts to sound the same. Even if the areas I thought to be filler were carefully considered or based on motives throughout the piece the actual product, because of the way is presented, does not call attention to this fact specially because the idiom you're using is quite narrow in terms of motive unity.

And thats why the piece is only 4 mins instead of 20.

This reminded me of Tetris.

I really liked the right hand part in this. This was very interesting to listen to. I personally liked the repeated sections.

This reminded me of Tetris.

I really liked the right hand part in this. This was very interesting to listen to. I personally liked the repeated sections.

Thanks. I was a gamer when I as a kid, and still am to some extent, so I'm sure there's some influence in my music in some places. I'm still tinkering with the ideas of the form itself, i'd really love to see a form that is one massive development on a theme or themes.