Virgil for Orchestra

This is a piece my friend I started a couple of years ago while juniors in high school. This was our first composition and was written for band. Valdosta State University's Wind Ensemble premiered the band version, and the live performance of that work is on the band forum. This version is for potential performance by Georgia Southern University's Orchestra, where we will be sophomore composition majors. I've never dealt with strings before, so one of the biggest things I want feedback from are the string parts. Are the ostinatos possible to play in the string part? Should I switch things up? Should the strings play other parts? I'm pretty secure with the wind portion, but if you have any suggestions for that, I'd be glad to hear them as well. Thanks, and I hope you enjoy!

Contrabass cannot go that low. Their lowest note is the E below the staff; HOWEVER, contrabass transposes an octave down, so the notes you've written are possible, they simply need to be written an octave higher to sound there.

The cadential point just before reh. C felt really abrupt and unresolved to me - you have such feverish motion throughout the whole ensemble for so long, then suddenly the orchestration thins drastically and the rhythm halts. I'd suggest a more gradual slowing.

The snare drum rhythm doesn't make sense, unless I'm misreading something: you have eight note triplet, eighth note, then a sixteenth note triplet with four partials...then the same thing again. I assume you want a sixteenth note triplet with three partials, but I'm not too sure.

You should know, the sus cymbal part you have written at reh. D - the fp will be hard to make clean because of the long decay of the cymbal. Even more so if you're using yarn mallets. You might try a f attack followed by a choke with a stick, then a roll with mallets? Though that might be hard to coordinate.

Overall I think the piece will suffer from over-orchestration in spots, and the transitional material between sections needs some work, but you have a solid work on your hands, highly energetic and quick in duration.

Contrabass cannot go that low. Their lowest note is the E below the staff; HOWEVER, contrabass transposes an octave down, so the notes you've written are possible, they simply need to be written an octave higher to sound there.

The cadential point just before reh. C felt really abrupt and unresolved to me - you have such feverish motion throughout the whole ensemble for so long, then suddenly the orchestration thins drastically and the rhythm halts. I'd suggest a more gradual slowing.

The snare drum rhythm doesn't make sense, unless I'm misreading something: you have eight note triplet, eighth note, then a sixteenth note triplet with four partials...then the same thing again. I assume you want a sixteenth note triplet with three partials, but I'm not too sure.

You should know, the sus cymbal part you have written at reh. D - the fp will be hard to make clean because of the long decay of the cymbal. Even more so if you're using yarn mallets. You might try a f attack followed by a choke with a stick, then a roll with mallets? Though that might be hard to coordinate.

Overall I think the piece will suffer from over-orchestration in spots, and the transitional material between sections needs some work, but you have a solid work on your hands, highly energetic and quick in duration.

Thanks - I will change the Contrabass part. The percussion part is pretty much like it is in 12/8. That beat is the equivalent of an 8th and four 16ths in 12/8 times. Not sure if there is a better way to write it. I will talk to Patrick about the Sus. Cymbal since he is a percussion guy. Where are some of the over-orchestrated sections? I tend to do that sometimes to try to prevent boring parts for people.

THIRD TIME.

You mentioned before that you felt the piece was at the place it needs to be with not many changes needed and basically shot down any suggestions. Hopefully this could give you a better idea of the flaws of the piece and what you can do to make it even better.

1. I would change the key in the beginning. You have to understand that Johan Warburton is not in every ensemble in the world and horns shouldn't be hitting G#s and As in abundance.

2. I don't really like what you did with the horns in measure 8. It won't cut through that much and its kind of unnecessary for something double in strings.

3. Your third clarinet and third trumpet parts are very unnecessary.

4. Two bassoon parts is nice and is the standard, but the bassoons are almost always in unison in this piece. Also I feel like the bassoon is vastly misused as an instrument because you have it primarily under the staff emulating a mini tuba-trombone rather than a very beautiful instrument.

5. the 8va in the pic is totally unnecessary and kind of high for them. Just know that for piccolo anything over an A is hard for the player and painful to the audience.

6. Forcefully accented shouldn't be an excuse to not write in accents. -.- In all seriousness, I think it would be more clear to the performer and cleaner to the score to add them in.

7. I feel like this section at 24 is a nice brief contrast and should be a bit longer. (2-4 bars.) Also, trumpets should be muted as to not provide a foil for the delicate flutes.

8. At C i think the oboe and first horn should play a whole note and then continue with the part you have written.

9. M. 37. Piccolo. SHOULD NEVER play that high. Especially hitting high Bs and Cs. I was taught to never write your piccolo higher than flute. Naturally there are always exceptions, but this is definitely not one.

10. this is really picky, but i don't like what you did in 1st/2nd clarinet/trumpet in which 2nd part is higher than first.

11. This section has a lot of unison, but I think it could benefit and be even better if you analyzed the music here and analyzed the colors of the strings and winds to create a very beautiful chorale. Not that it isn't, I just see a bunch of missed opportunities.

12. I think the section at D could benefit from support of Tubas and Low Horns.

13. E. this is the part that makes me laugh. You have 3rd clarinet playing triplets in a register that definitely won't cut through, your second flute is the only woodwind not playing, and you have 2nd/3rd trumpet playing in a register that won't cut through making the 1st trumpet do much more work than they should. I'd definitely remove the 3rd clarinet/trumpet parts, but if you feel they MUST stay in the piece then I would double 3rd clarinet with second in that octave and take 2nd/3rd trumpets up an octave. an add that second flute in, they're gonna feel lonely resting by themselves!

14. 87. You have 1st/2nd trumpet on quarter note triplets with 3rd trumpets playing that ostinato in a register that definitely won't cut through. Remove the part, or double it with 2nd. Also, I feel like that ostinato is kind of a filler in the music and doesn't really add much to the piece to me.

15. 91-92. I think the triplets could be re orchestrated in a manner to provide a much more effective ending. Also, I don't think tuba and horns should play the triplets since the response time for faster playing on these instruments is kind of slow. In the last measure I think the entire ensemble should play the triplet figure, I feel as if the lower voices might resonate over the triplet and not make it as clean.

16. I definitely agree with Dev about the snare part. It's basically the same throughout the piece and doesn't really do much for me. I think this could benefit from mallet percussion.

17. Nothing much more to comment on besides high piccolo notes and bad bassoon orchestration.

Great work, I really liked this and I know you will continue to work hard to make it an amazing piece.

14.

Ohhhh okay I understand the snare part now. The whole thing is the triplet...I'm trying to think of a clearer way to notate that, but I think you've basically done it. I just wasn't thinking.

^^^I dunno about "the piccolo should never play higher than the flute" (assuming you mean written), but you DO have some wicked high picc notes. The piccolo can play up to the C above the C above the staff, and since it transposes an octave higher, this corresponds with the highest note on the piano. Do-able, yes, but not recommended in just your average part - more for an effect.

as far as specific areas of over-orchestration, rehearsal B-D seems like too much for too long, as well as E to the end, but it's hard to say for sure...i don't really know what it would sound like with real instruments, nor do I know the piece it was adapted from, but generally if you find yourself using the full ensemble a lot in a piece, it's going to be over-orchestrated...full orchestra should be saved for big moments and/or climaxes.