Trio for Flute, Viola, and Piano

Hi YC! I know it's been a long time, but here's a new piece: my trio for flute, viola and piano

In March the Juilliard pre-college orchestra will read my "Earth sympony" and "Exotica", and at the end of April, a trio will play this. Please listen, comment, and enjoy!

Trio for Flute, Viola, and Piano

EDIT: New version!

Hey,

This is quite good! I honestly wasn't expecting something like this. I really liked the form and the construction of ideas. Something that you can work on in the future is the conversational aspect of the piece. Especially writing like this, with lots of interaction, you should pay attention to how a melody would imitate a vocal line and incorporate that into your writing. You were already doing some of it near the end of the piece. In addition, I realize this is a short piece, but when you do write a longer, more thought-involved piece for this type of ensemble, I would encourage you to use more extended techniques for each instrument and more variety.

Keep writing! :)

Bump

Please listen to the new version, with the final movement!

Heckel

This is actually really good, which I did not expect from you. Respect, man.

Thank you for commenting!

Uh, guys, come on! Post your thoughts! I want to know what you think!

Also, on April 30th, when a trio (I know who they are, don't worry) will be playing this, and I'll be sure to upload the live version, which will be WAY better than this crappy midi!

Heckel

Bump :closedeyes:

I want to know what you think!! Please say anything that you thought about it.

I just listened to the first movement and it's pretty fun! I like that you keep your material simple and concise: a recognizable melody with interesting rhythms, only a few dynamic markings, and "open" harmonies, namely using fourths, fifths, and octaves. I especially enjoyed 16 to 24 (you made the sound of bagpipes there), 39 to 44, and 97 to 105. The sections where you use everyone (and employ imitation) are the most interesting to me. It feels a little sparse at times, but other than that I very much enjoyed it! Your score is very clear, although there are some odd blank spaces whenever you have a key sig. change. Also, performance indications like arco typically go above the staff (m. 137), and a grace note slur often goes from below the grace in order to avoid collisions with articulations (see how the first flute marcato is rather high in measure 16 because the slur of the grace note is in the way?). These are cosmetic issues and won't affect your performance, but I'm telling you since you're clearly striving for the whole package. It's great that your score is so clean so we can clearly understand your musical ideas.

I'll come check out the other movements another time. Thanks for sharing!

Well! Here's something new and different from you!

The musical ideas here are nicely developed - perhaps my favourite aspect of the piece. At times it does seem a bit bare, as Orpheus said, and I might have liked to hear more harmony in the parts, yet I get the feeling that the openness of it was by design rather than because you didn't know what to do to fill it in, since when you wanted to, you were able to make the texture quite full indeed. The pedale tenuto in the slow movement was an interesting touch, as were all the jagged rhythms as juxtaposed to the progression of slow, sustained notes. The contrapuntal sections in the third movement worked well, and I love how you gathered together thematic material from previous movements and interspersed them here. I was thunderstruck when you had the flautist switch to piccolo, but once I got to thinking about it, I had to ask myself, "why the heck not?" - as long as you clearly call for it in advance. The artificial harmonics for the viola in the third movement are risky, but again, as long as you know they are, why not?

I like where you're going with your style. Keep up the good work, and congratulations.

Thank you for your comments Orpheus and J. Lee!

Orpheus- The technical score issues I can fix easily, if it would make the score easier to read. Though the 5ths and 4ths and octaves are my style. I use them because I like them, not because I don't know how to fill it in. I'm not arguing, but that's really kind of something to expect from me... :P

J. Lee- Thank you for all the nice comments! The harmonics on the viola are not that hard, actually. I play viola, so when I worked that out I found a way to make it work. Piccolo is one of my favorite instruments, which is part of the reason I used it. The others are that the person who will be playing it plays piccolo very, very well, and that when I wanted something high, it didn't sound good on piano at all.

Thanks again!

Heckel

(P.S new ending, I'll get that in)

This is easily the best thing I've heard from you so far. You've been making MAJOR progress! I like how you go back and forth from consonance to dissonance in the 3rd movement.

Thank you Jair!

I hope that I can get a good recording of the performance on April 30th, as it will sound SO much better than this horrible MIDI.

Thanks for all the comments!

Heckel

I would love to hear this performed. It looks pretty solid! Just to forewarn you regarding the fifths in the viola: the way they are written (with the grace note, and without a possibility of doing them on a first finger) those are reeeeeeally hard to play in tune. Just because of the angle of the finger against the fingerboard.... otherwise there's things in that score that I use all the time. Good work, can't wait to hear it!

Good job on this. The melodic content was unified throughout the movements, and the form worked nicely. My main critique would be that your harmonic language is a bit bipolar -- your tonal sections are quite tonal and your "atonal" sections seem to come out of nowhere and have very little to do with what preceded them. I would strongly suggest "spicing up" your tonal sections with some added dissonances and chromaticism... not constantly, just often enough so that the less tonal sections don't seem so wildly out of place. Also, you could do a lot more with the instruments (especially the piano). If you're not a pianist, I'd recommend studying some chamber music scores with piano by great composers; perhaps you'll get some ideas as to how to make the piano part more elaborate. And, as mentioned previously by another poster, conversational interplay between the instruments will make your piece a lot more varied and interesting.

Nice work!

Thank you for the comments!

OP: I'm a violist, and I realize that they may be hard to be in tune, but it's not THAT hard :P

JC: Yea, I guess you're kinda right, that it is quite tonal... but really, my intention was to have a completely tonal mvt, an atonal mvt, and then one where it was all mixed up.... I'll look into that, but I didn't find it that shocking (I did want it to be a bit surprising)

Thanks again!

Heckel

Here is a link to the performance!!!

Good piece graham. It sound a bit french to me. Especially the wholetone sections. Gives the piece a nice floating, atmospheric character, impressionistic. This is juxtaposed with lovely jazzy introjections like the figure in ms 12/4 of the first mov. I really love that section.

At times you have a bit too much start and stop going on. For me that interferres with the flow. Otherwise a cool piece, and a nice performance. Congrats with that!

Hi Heckel!

I like this piece! It has this..."chinese" feel with some pentatonic scales here and there And i love the lively rhythmic motifs(especially in the piano)!!

(pardon my weak critique skills)

AND IT SOUNDS HAPPY. hones:

aww fank you CJ :D Glad you liked it and noticed the pentatonic-y things. I just so happened to be very fond of that scale!

And thanks for your comments and critiques Jaap!

Heckel