Piano Concerto, I

Hello. This is not my newest piece, but I realized today I hadn't yet uploaded it anywhere. I don't know how I could have forgotten, since this piece is one of my composition teacher's favored ones. There is also 'Grave', which I might post here, when the planets align themselves properly.

It's fairly short for a first movement, if you're used to Mozart or Beethoven proportions. But I have not had a thought about structure, form, or any of that. I don't expect to complete this for at least two years. I just don't think I could write anything that continues the energy of this movement until I 'gain some levels'.

Enjoy, anyhow.

Piano Concerto, I

Well there's definitely some good stuff in there.

Some lovely chords.

However there are somethings which I would work on in the piece.

There is no real direction to the piece. Also - no main theme. These things go together, and will bring a lot to the piece. Form - you should do a bit of research, or at least some planning of a logical form for the piece to follow. Try to bear in mind what the audience will be hearing. I.e. they don't know the piece inside out, so if you have a recurring theme, then that's something for them to hold on to.

The virtuosity in the piece doesn't have any reason to be there. It's not built up, and seems to just be there to be impressive. The passagework in itself is pretty good though.

These are my main complaints with it - but certainly there is enjoyable music in there, and some good writing. I liked the middle section with the piano arpeggios with the orchestra.

Keep going ;)

Thank you, Daniel-Whose-Piano-Concerto-is-Better-Than-Mine. You're right about the lack of form. That's my least developed area, which has earned me N.S. Canzano's haughty disdain. I have books about forms and that business. But this summer is about idiot creativity for me, though I wrote this piece during the school year. I may not rejigger it until I'm off at music school, which will be August twenty-something-th. I'm sure I'll have a lot more to contribute here, then.

Lovely chords are my area of highest development, I think. I've been criticized for being motionless, or themeless fairly often. I enjoy sections consisting mostly of whole notes and ties. There's not much of that in this piece, but there's a fair amount in other, earlier pieces.

No direction - yeah. I suppose that's true. My main goal was to produce a piece of romantic showmanship. There are tricks and near-cliches that I neglected to include, as I was writing this in the two weeks before the "recital" at which I played a recording of it. The section you mentioned liking was adapted from a Chopin-like piano piece I had written earlier. The string interlude just before the end was also adapted from an earlier piece.

No main theme - not quite true, methinks. The opening chords I considered the main theme, though I didn't really develop them, except for that short little reprise and the little extension I put on.

Virtuosity - yes, it's rather mindless. But that's part of what I set out to write. I'm not a showy pianist, but the arpeggio figure seemed to work. The rapid scale is there because I felt it was the only way to get enough intensity to make the chromatic-ish string figures that come after it less jarring. I could have built up to it, yes, but time was rather short. The recital coincided with finals.

I'm glad my writing is alright, in your opinion. I recieved a brutal review of this piece elsewhere, one of whose sentences reads "I've always thought that the piano concertos are best left to the greats of classical music, cause no one else has been able to write a good one". Just before this, the author called the piece "ugly sound, with no melody". I was beginning to think he was just being completely honest.

Ugly piece with no melody.?lol. You should have told him that unlike the world of film and literature there is really a global lack of good musical reviewers in the world. The piece, with its strange chord progressions, was based more on producing sound colour rather than a melodic line. Any idiot with half a brain could see that... I'd say that the combination of high Romantic Chopinesque progressions (if I'm not wrong I think you got the opening chords from nocturne in C#min-) coupled with quite a resonant unique timbre (the latter being more of a derivative of impressionistic music) is really striking.

People usually say oh yeh ofcourse you need a strong melodic line, but thats just another way of saying you don't need to aim higher and have a composite of different elements working together. You have the basis for something much greater in this concerto. The thing is its the singular arpeggiated stuff that made the piece lack substance. I can't orchestrate for scraggy though but yeh...

Overall I thought the piece conveyed a very strong sense of alienation ...

Anyhoo I looked at your website and I think you're really weird. Its good though I like you're odd sense of humour.

I wanna see you're big far out pieces posted asap! . Could you post them in midi format as well though I have been getting alot of scraggy from my folks about exceeding the download limit...

People on here don't seem to realise that midi might sacrifice sound quality but advocating for better quality costs alot...

Yes, well, I like it. :P

Ugly piece with no melody.?lol. You should have told him that unlike the world of film and literature there is really a global lack of good musical reviewers in the world. The piece, with its strange chord progressions, was based more on producing sound colour rather than a melodic line. Any idiot with half a brain could see that... I'd say that the combination of high Romantic Chopinesque progressions (if I'm not wrong I think you got the opening chords from nocturne in C#min-) coupled with quite a resonant unique timbre (the latter being more of a derivative of impressionistic music) is really striking.

People usually say oh yeh ofcourse you need a strong melodic line, but thats just another way of saying you don't need to aim higher and have a composite of different elements working together. You have the basis for something much greater in this concerto. The thing is its the singular arpeggiated stuff that made the piece lack substance. I can't orchestrate for scraggy though but yeh...

Overall I thought the piece conveyed a very strong sense of alienation ...

Anyhoo I looked at your website and I think you're really weird. Its good though I like you're odd sense of humour.

I wanna see you're big far out pieces posted asap! . Could you post them in midi format as well though I have been getting alot of scraggy from my folks about exceeding the download limit...

People on here don't seem to realise that midi might sacrifice sound quality but advocating for better quality costs alot...

Sorries. But the midi just wouldn't do justice to some of the good parts of this piece. You mentioned your feeling that the piece was more about sound color than melody. Well, I think that midi is rather grey. Not in a synaesthetic way, but in a 'feeling' way.

That F. Chopin is a bastard. He's already done all those nice chord progressions up in black velvet bows. And you just can't beat black velvet bows. :) I really didn't know that progression was from a Chopin nocturne. It's really simple - based around diminished chords and dominant sevenths. I was thinking more of the Pathetique than of Chopin, likely. I hadn't yet become friendly with Chopin then.

I'm glad to hear you say you think there is something grand buried here. I have that feeling, myself, but it doesn't count for much. All mothers love their ugly children. I have always liked this piece of mine, and so have others.

"A composite of different elements working together..." -- That's quite insightful. I'm not sure I knew that myself.

"A strong sense of alienation..." -- Yeah, that's what I'm about, sometimes. Not a real people person, anyway. There is an annual event that always makes me feel alienated and wrongfooted. This piece was written probably as far away as one can get from that time of year, without being on the way back. But somehow, I feel like that's what inspired it.

I'm glad you get my sense of humor. I am weird. Unusual, anyway. As far as big, far out pieces: I'm fresh out. There is a piece posted on the site, though, called 'Grave'. It's not far out, really. But it was the piece that consumed most of my composition time for a month or two (composition time = 30 mins/day?). It's worth a listen, though a little lacking in the self-expression.

I have been in a bit of an unproductive state. I've been working to get a new computer working, and it has been, but today it poo pooed, again. Some kind of display problem...I think. I have some bare sketches and things, but those won't be processed for a while. I'm feeling rather bad today, which is good for anyone wanting more music from me.

Sorry again about the mp3, but I doubt I'll be changing my ways. I will likely post both, in the future. Posting midis worries me, because all one needs to do is run them through a sampler, record them, and send them of to the Library of Congress for a copyright. Though this is the very last place on the internet whose members I would expect to do that. And I suppose I have a rather inflated sense of my own skill if I think anyone's itching to gank my copyrights. Whateva.

To Mitchell -- Thank you, kindly. You laconic poster person.

^^

Ha, I had to tell you and I don't really know much technical theory stuff.

Good job. ^_^

Sorry again about the mp3, but I doubt I'll be changing my ways. I will likely post both, in the future. Posting midis worries me, because all one needs to do is run them through a sampler, record them, and send them of to the Library of Congress for a copyright. Though this is the very last place on the internet whose members I would expect to do that.

Still best to be cautious. You don't have to be a member to play the midis here - well, you didn't back in April when I was lurking to see what gave.

I always post a datestamped copy of both music and score to myself before posting them elsewhere.

Good luck.

M