Darkness Within: Tribute to Lord of the Flies

Composition based on the life of Ralph from the Lord of the Flies by William Golding.

Darkness Within: Tribute to Lord of the Flies

First off, welcome to Young Composers! This is a very nice start on a piece. It had me engaged the entire time. Had some very nice ideas. and I think you variated everything nicely so it never got old. Some things to work on: First off, add some articulations. I didn't see any throughout the piece. Even if you don't plan on having this played live, and you just want the sound file off Finale, adding articulations is good practice anyway for the future. Second, some of your parts get very repetitious in the woodwinds. Instead of having the whole section play the same thing numerous measures in a row, try switching out different woodwind instruments so they players don't get tired or bored, and also to give it a different color. Also, sometimes some ranges on instruments were a little too high or low (particularly tenor sax stuck out). And technically, a lot of woodwind players would have trouble tonguing a lot of the faster parts you have. This another part where articulation comes in to effect. With that said, I greatly enjoyed the piece, and it had some very nice ideas! Keep writing!

• I thought the material was very appropriate to the subject. The drama and conflict of the story was clearly evident throughout. The use of ostianato in the winds is great-- I'm always a sucker for that sort of thing, and I think it really adds to the tension.
  
• The variation in the piece worked well, transitioning (more on that below) just as I started to get less interested in the material. Good instincts.
  
• As a whole, I though you used the ensemble well, and most of the writing seemed idiomatic a majority of the time. (MaskedTrumpeter's caution for ranges is the one caveat here).
  

• Although I liked the woodwind ostianato, it is overused. The best advice I can give here is to come up with 2-3 more ostianato figures based on the original, and vary it more. Shouldn't be difficult, and will really improve the overall quality of the piece.
  
• The transitions need some work. They don't feel natural, but jagged. Try some cymbal rolls or perhaps more gradual transitions, especially from loud to soft.
  
• Re: the drama and tension of the story-- there are some pretty ugly things in the book-- I think it would be interesting to add a section with a bit more dissonance in order to highlight that. It doesn't have to be something crazy atonal, but with a lot more tension and, to be frank, ugliness.
  
• As noted above, this needs a pass to put in articulations and consider breathing problems that might arise from measure upon measure of ostianato.
  
• Finally, I'm a stickler for a clean score, and this could use some serious work on that front. Dynamics, beams, and all sorts of other objects collide all over the score, to the point where parts of it are barely legible. Try reducing the staff size if you can't fix this. If you have the latest version of Sibelius (version 6), you can also switch on Magnetic Layout, which will automatically correct most of these problems.