Blissful Morning (Classical Version)

Blissful Morning (Opus 15, classical version) written for piano, flute, violoncello, and a little dose of synthesizer in the finale. Originally, I planned on adding a toy piano sound, but unfortunately my software (Logic Pro X) doesn't have one. Instead of that, one of the syntheiszer leads has been added. The piece is written in F major entirely. I was trying to not jump too much in the rhythm sections or harmony, since my music teacher advised me to try to stick to one idea - sometimes less is more, and ideal doesn't mean perfect. If you like this version, please check out the electro one available on this site too! Thank you for listening, any helpful hints and comments! 

MIDI sound kind of ruins this one a little bit. Not your fault. Slur problems in both the cello and flute throughout... most of them aren't impossible, they're just very impractical. Some would argue that the sound is all that matters, but I say that live recordings sound so good partly because they're written in a playable manner. I know it's a stylistic choice, but I would have maybe branched off a little bit from F major throughout (same can be said for you electronic version), but it works fine here, I suppose. What scoring program do you use? Some of those slurs and stuff interfere with the notes too much; just engraving issues. Solid work.

This is a nice piece,reminds me of some of Philip Glass' earlier works. I agree with Monarcheon that the MIDI sound really ruins it, especially for the piano part. My question is this: is this primarily intended to be a piano solo? Because the piano kind of steals the show. There's just a lot going on in the piano part and it stays mf or above for the majority of the piece. There are sections where having the piano in the forefront with the cello and piano accentuating it sounds really fantastic, but I think you could play around with giving the flute and cello more spotlight (having piano rest with flute and piano play a duet section, pairing cello and piano or flute and piano with equally important parts, etc.) 

I mean if you intend to have the piano be the spotlight for the whole thing that's perfectly fine, though even then I would still dial the piano back a notch or two.

On 19.09.2016 at 6:30 PM, Monarcheon said:

MIDI sound kind of ruins this one a little bit. Not your fault. Slur problems in both the cello and flute throughout... most of them aren't impossible, they're just very impractical. Some would argue that the sound is all that matters, but I say that live recordings sound so good partly because they're written in a playable manner. I know it's a stylistic choice, but I would have maybe branched off a little bit from F major throughout (same can be said for you electronic version), but it works fine here, I suppose. What scoring program do you use? Some of those slurs and stuff interfere with the notes too much; just engraving issues. Solid work.

 

I use MuseScore for scoring and Logic Pro X for MIDI. Unfortunately, none of the people in my music and technology class are capable of recording music either on flute or cello; I don't play those instruments at all and my piano skills are rather low as well.

On 21.09.2016 at 11:26 AM, SebastianViola said:

This is a nice piece,reminds me of some of Philip Glass' earlier works. I agree with Monarcheon that the MIDI sound really ruins it, especially for the piano part. My question is this: is this primarily intended to be a piano solo? Because the piano kind of steals the show. There's just a lot going on in the piano part and it stays mf or above for the majority of the piece. There are sections where having the piano in the forefront with the cello and piano accentuating it sounds really fantastic, but I think you could play around with giving the flute and cello more spotlight (having piano rest with flute and piano play a duet section, pairing cello and piano or flute and piano with equally important parts, etc.) 

I mean if you intend to have the piano be the spotlight for the whole thing that's perfectly fine, though even then I would still dial the piano back a notch or two.

 

You're probably right, but as you guessed it - the piano is here the star and the flute and cello just a bonus; a spice that was meant to add a little bit of variety. Thanks for the comment!

On 19.09.2016 at 6:30 PM, Monarcheon said:

MIDI sound kind of ruins this one a little bit. Not your fault. Slur problems in both the cello and flute throughout... most of them aren't impossible, they're just very impractical. Some would argue that the sound is all that matters, but I say that live recordings sound so good partly because they're written in a playable manner. I know it's a stylistic choice, but I would have maybe branched off a little bit from F major throughout (same can be said for you electronic version), but it works fine here, I suppose. What scoring program do you use? Some of those slurs and stuff interfere with the notes too much; just engraving issues. Solid work.

 

Also do you think it would be probably better to leave an open hand for flute and cello in the slurs part? I don't have much knowledge about how, for example long a flute player can hold one sound depending on the breathing capability (not familiar with both cello and flute in practical dimensions). Would it be acceptable to leave this aspect blank, without specifying anything? I wish my works to be interesting, but not impossible to play by real instruments of course.

It would be one thing if there were multiple players. But there aren't. For stringed instruments, you're going to want to imagine them drawing a bow across a string... how long do you think you could do that without having to change bows? Also keep in mind that playing at the tip will not yield as much sound. You're going to want to read up on this. For winds it's easier because you just play along with the breathing pattern you have. If there's a lot of tricky long slur passages adding in breath marks can help.