atonal variations

Here's my first attempt at serialism; i take any suggestions you may have.

Variations.pdf

Variations.mid

Variations.sib

Here's my first attempt at serialism; i take any suggestions you may have.

Your use of rhytms isn't very far from what could be expected from a tonal work. Serialism works very well with complex rhytms, tuplets and quintuplets makes it really interesting. If you think of it every musical style has it's traits and standard gestures. The results are often not convincing if you combine an aspect of one style with another (exceptions always exist of course). For example having an opera singer singing RnB might not yield the best results (but again, there can always be exceptions).

And even though it's "atonal" doesn't mean you can't have a direction with your music. Think of where you got your points of departure and arrival. Try to think of your music as a journey from one to the other. For example, a piece might start out with a rising figure in the bass which constantly increases in rhythm and eventually is taken over by a treble instrument and finally reaches a climax on a high fortissimo note and then gradually falls back down again while slowing down. This is a very clear example of direction through the use of register, line, rhythm and dynamic.

If you thought it was fun to write serialism I would suggest you write more stuff in the same style. Nothing is better than keeping on trying. Remember that it's better to finish a lot of short pieces that aren't great than leaving a dozen of unfinished long pieces. Oh, and it can be helpful for inspiration to listen to serial pieces by Webern and Berg for example.

I hope I was of any use.

Thanks for the comments