Duet for sopranos - "I see the abyss"

I set a poem of mine to music on the occasion that two soprano friends of mine wanted a duet to perform.Finale's rendition sucks terribly because it lacks the rubato, the humanity, and the "freedom from the piano" part that is specifically asked for at the beginning of the piece (written in Portuguese on the score).I'll post a proper recording eventually.By eventually I mean when they sing it.By when they sing it I mean ages from now.Duet for sopranos - "I can see the abyss"

Duet for sopranos - "I see the abyss"

It's a shame to see that this was completely ignored by people. This is a really nice work, Berlioz. I love how you captured the lyrics with the music - very nice work, indeed! One of my favorites now! Thanks for sharing!

Great job, Berlioz! I loved the changes in tempo and meter, especially when you introduced the 16th triplets in the piu mosso sections. I liked how you alternated between homophony and polyphony between the voices, the two parts meshed really well together. Nice harmonies and melodic ideas, the piece was consistent in its character but never uninteresting.

Overall the score looks great, though there are a few things I'd like to point out. For one, you should try to have as few accidentals as possible. Many times you have an F# to F nat, where'd it'd be much easier to read with a Gb (in the main accompaniment material, for example, but also in a few other places). Chords should all use the same type of accidental, too, there are many instances where you have both a sharp and a flat in a chord or interval and that's annoying to read. You might want to add some dynamics for the singers, unless you want them to decide what they are, in which case you should probably indicate that in the score. Some slur markings for the piano would help, too, unless you want all of the notes detached...

Besides that you have a marvelous piece here, and urge you to get it performed as soon as possible! Obviously Finale will never (or not very soon, at least) be able to replicate a human voice for a song, so a live recording will really make this piece shine. Can't wait to hear it live!

Thanks!

Oh, nevermind the piano part for now, it's horribly written, but it's just so I can get a quick glance at the "shape" and know what to play as a reflex. This came from something I used to play tons of times when alone at the piano so it's already inside my head. xD

About the dynamics, I still haven't decided that and will talk to the sopranos about it. It might just occur to me during the rehearsals. I have serious problems hearing dynamics in my head for such small ensemble pieces, because I have enough trouble imagining the voices...

Wow, this is really great!! So eery and beautiful. My only comments are what was already said about the F#s.. but you've said the score will be fixed so that's not a problem. Also, I like how each part seems to have equal importance for the most part, except at the end, where just now the 1st sings the echo of the opening statement. I think it would sound really cool if they sang that last part in unison. Of course, you might have a specific sound in mind there.. but somehow I felt like the 2nd soprano was missing something at the end. Maybe an echo or unison, idk.

This is really haunting and beautiful... I think you did a great job! Normally I might suggest more variation in the piano part, but I really enjoyed your recurring figures. Is it coincidence that the highest note of the piece is on the word "room?" Those triplets that first come in at 19 are great.

There are a number of small notational issues. It sounds like you have more plans for the composition, but I'll tell you what I see now anyway. First, it's not necessary to break the beams in the vocal parts for each new word. That's an older, frankly outdated convention. It's cool to beam the vocal lines as you normally would in a given time signature. Naturals behind notes are odd-looking, like in measure 11. It's more common to put the accidental in front of the note. When you have a protraction, like in m. 12 voice 2, there should also be a slur (the same goes for syllables that cover multiple notes, like drow- of drowning in mm. 18-19). Also, there conventions for how to split a word into its syllables. Drowning is actually drown-ing rather than drow-ning. You can use thefreedictionary.com to check for those, although sometimes different countries do it differently (I'm looking at you, England).

Wow! Wow. That was really cool! I can VIVIDLY hear it in my head even though it was a finale realization. I can hear the sopranos just busting it out and using crisp consonants. The parts where it sped up and there was intense triplets...So good! The accels gave it such rich intensity... I cannot WAIT to hear the real recording of this. Great work! I'll be checking back soon!

-Keegan