Our Hero Dies

Hi everyone,This is my latest piece. I tried to compose a sad but heroic tune, with the image in my head of overview camera shots of things the hero had done, and how the world is left behind.I hope you like it. I plan on making a sequel to this, so please tell me what you missed or how did this make you feel, and how you want it to make you feel, etc :). So feel free to comment!

Our Hero Dies

It has a very ominous, melancholy feel. The first phrase ends on a unison in the horns, which I thought needed to end as it was presented (contrapuntal), with a -cadence- of sorts with Bb AND Db giving us the sonority you prepared.

Needs harp arpeggiation when the strings come in, or perhaps some kind of low, soft, resonating pizzicato notes in the celli and basses when the solo violin enters. The percussion is a nice effect (the snare drum), giving me the sense that it's a fallen warrior we're mourning the death of... I dig that.

Good work. I really enjoyed it.

Nice - you're getting better and better!!

I really like the sense of mournfulness, and the tasteful instrument selection.

There probably should be some addition to the solo violin, like atiatonality said. However, the major criticism is - the ending. It seems to cut off abruptly, so unless you're going to sow the second part back, you should probably fix that.

Still, it really sounds more epic as I listen to it for 2 or 3 times, so yay, sounds good !!

Thanks for the Great comments :) I am really glad with these advices guys, I will see if I can make use of them, and will experiment with the instruments you mentioned. I am glad you liked it!

The melody and harmonies work great in this. The problem I have is with the timbre.

Having the Horns play the whole way thru is overdoing it IMO. I think it would help a lot if when the Violin comes in, you go away from the Horns and bring in a different Timbre.

Ron

Agreed with all statements above You could give some more umph to the swell, timbre wise and also maybe give the snare drum a roll at the end? Just to build more? Well dome

Hi J!

I like the mood you've got going here, but the horn line you've written sounds like it ought to be a solo, and if it is then you need to give your hypothetical performer some breathing room. Otherwise I felt the whole thing was wildly under-scaled and anti-climatic. For something that's meant to make me feel an epic mood, it falls totally flat because it's extremely thin, quite quiet, and carries itself in an almost unobtrusive manner that makes it pass by without leaving a significant impression. That was my feeling anyway, so with that in mind I would recommend you expand and liven up the orchestration significantly to enhance the effect you're after.

Thanks for sharing!

Oh by the way, this is in E minor for most of the piece. It said "our hero dies in B flat minor". o_O

@ all: Thanks for listening and giving these comments, I really appreciate this!

@ Ron:

The choice of the Horns playing the entire piece was a deliberate decision. I think it would give the piece another timbre indeed when I would remove the horns, I might try to experiment with this.

@ Kevin:

I will check the snare roll at the end ;)

And about your second post: Thats right, but with the upload system I needed to choose in what key it was written, haha. It at least end in B minor, and I had a fis and a cis in my key so.... :P

@ Marius:

About the solo: that's right, but how you want me to give him breath pauses, should I give the horn every bar a rest of an 8th note? And about your advice to liven up the orchestration: do you think I should do this for both phrases, or only for the second one?

Again, I want to thank you all for the great advices, I will do something with this for sure. In some time you can expect a second version of this :)

Merry Xmas everyone!

It doesn't have to be a breath every measure, no. A nice way to estimate where a breath will be needed is to try buzzing your lips (as the horn player would need to) and see how long you can do it before you run out of breath — when you do....breath mark! It's a rough method, but it works. As for the orchestration, I think it needs to be beefed up and thickened throughout, then more in the second phrase to highlight the sense of development.

You're good at composing, but I wouldn't say orchestrating. Nice violin, though.

Thanks guys! I will do something with this, and I'll post the next version soon!

Another approach to breathing is looking at the phrasing of the line the instrument is playing. The most important part of indicating breathing is indicating where not to breath, but rather than tell a performer, "Don't breath," you're showing the performer where you believe the best places are for them to breath.

In an ostinato pattern you can incorporate breathing into the actual composition of the work, changing colors among instruments by having instruments imitate or restate certain phrases played by other instruments. Perhaps you want the same timbre throughout the ostinato. Imagine this being done by two Clarinet parts. Have each line offset the other so that through the combining of phrases from both, you're getting a solid musical ostinato figure like the one in this example:

Here, both parts are playing the line in a phrased pattern offset by one measure. Phrasing is just as important as imagining or trying to reproduce the performance experience, which is also very good practice.

wow man that ended way too quickly for its awesome-ness... GET BACK TO FINISHING IT IMMEDIATELY lol. The beginning was kinda rambo'ish (which is good - we all like rambo) until the high pitch violin came in. Very good originaltiy though and really did sound like a tragic event has taken place or as if this was written for a tragic character - which is job done for you lol!!!

once thing i would like to hear in this if you do finish it off is to try and get like a slow build up along with those snares you had from the beggining until you REACH the climax of the piece...

excellent though

Thanks for the comment man :) I am going to make a sequel, but first I have to do some other things ;) You should check out my second version, I have posted it here too, I made some changes since many people here commented on it. You might like that better... or not...:P

Greetz

I really enjoyed it! For some off reason, it reminds me of Terence Blanchards 25th hour score:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihmeUP0HyEQ&feature=related

Keep up the good work!