String Tio

A short string trio written for my second year portfolio. Marked as 'less ambitious than the rest of the works' by an examiner. Understandably, as it was written in two hours!Comment is free.String Tio

String Tio

Interesting. I'm not one for music of this variety, but I'll give you my thoughts.

I think that it is lacking in tonality, for one. But that is merely my taste...

Personal preference, however, I feel that this piece is rather unemotional and inexpressive, which could be the fault of the recording, I don't know. In a slower piece, I look for things that make me go "whoa that was cool." or a good conveyance of emotion. With your piece, I get "Whoa, that was weird" I think there needs to be more contrast between dissonance and harmony, because the constant dissonance you have here is really quite grating and tiring to the ears.

I'm not really sure what you meant by "chorale" either, but then again I'm not sure how a chorale would be expressed in a less-tonal setting. But from my experience, chorales of any sort generally move, at least in some part, together, and are rarely a melody sung by one part and held over whole notes in another - Chorales were, originally, Lutheran hymns to be sung, and it would sound odd to have the altos sing a melody in between two voices, I believe.

These are merely my thoughts, and I am far from an expert on the subject of music of this variety, however, I hoped you found my thoughts constructive.

-MF

A short string trio written for my second year portfolio. Marked as 'less ambitious than the rest of the works' by an examiner. Understandably, as it was written in two hours! Comment is free.

haha, was that as a critique of this piece, or a critique of the rest of the works?

I found this quite tonal, in or on c, the simplicity of the intrada reminded me in a way of shostakovich. I loved the minor none in the end.

The waltz was cool, although the pizz. sounded a bit obligatory, like the 2nd mvts of the debussy/ravel/... stringquartets. But maybe this is what I dislike about stringwriting, pizzicato is an alternate sound you have to use, wheter you like it or not... Back on the debussy/ravel-reference, your waltz had a vague jazz flavour.

The choral was my least favourite part. I like how the melody is given to the viola. When I look at the cello. I am guessing that the low c is meant to resonate. I am not sure whether that is possible too with the low Db in ms 34/36 and D in ms 37. Furthermore, the higher notes are most likely to be played on the D and A string, but how can the low C be slurred to those high notes? Maybe it gets better playable when you add something on the g string? Otherwise the G string has to be muted, or the high notes have to be played on the G and D string, but then the sound would become more poignant, and lose its capacity as accompaniment of the viola melody...

I liked this mate - had a really neat character although I think it really could benefit from a bit of development/restatement of the sections.

haha, was that as a critique of this piece, or a critique of the rest of the works?

I found this quite tonal, in or on c, the simplicity of the intrada reminded me in a way of shostakovich.

I guess looking back, I can see more tonality of it... but the way the C is always underneath a Db confuses me... What would you call this type of music?

As far as issues in the viola melody, it is all quite playable, but I would remove/change the f#/f natural double stop near the end, as that would require a very awkward shift of positions.