Morning Birds

Guten Tag!

This is one of the projects I have been working on this semester! Feel free to check out the concept behind it at this blog post: Composition Notebook: "Morning Birds" - the story.

What I am attaching for ya'll is the full score (which includes the cues for the three different flute parts, but not the actual parts), one of the flute parts (so you can see what they look like), a MIDI rendering of all the orchestra and flute parts combined, and a MIDI rendering of just the orchestra part (Titled "Three Violin Version..."). 

One of the flaws of the combined MIDI file is that the flute parts are made up of several short fragments/'bird calls',as you will see in the attached flute part, and the players will be improvising which bird call they play when. In other words, it will be a much more organic process than a computer just playing them all in order, as happens in the recording. 

I think the MP3 of everything combined sounds pretty terrible and clamorous which is not at all the intent of the piece. I suspect that this chaos will be lessened considerably when real players are performing this. If anyone has experience writing this sort of thing, I would really appreciate any advice you'd have to offer.

Also, I am happy to hear comments from anyone about this piece, whether they be about the orchestral writing, the special effects, or anything else.

Thank you and enjoy!

@celloman99

I saw that you were looking for a review exchange.

None of my pieces is looking for a review now, but I thought I should give one of yours a listen.

I can't promise a good review because I don't have much time.

Let me give it a listen.

Ok, so...

It might actually sound like that when being performed.

I don't think I ever heard a non chaotic performance of "In C", but that's, I think,

simply because when you deal with aleatoric music you take the risk it won't be as well organized as a piece that was written to be performed in one specific way.

Not to say that you shouldn't write aleatoric music, I actually wrote my first partly-aleatoric piece about two months ago.

But you do should have in mind that... well that it probably won't be exactly what you had in mind.

So that was my opinion about aleatoric music in your piece and the way it sounds.

In general... The piece felt a little unorganized.

Again, that might be the effect you wanted to create.

And yet, for me, having a more than five minutes piece with no theme or repetitions... I don't know, for me it was hard to follow.

What I think you should do, regarding that case, if you want flutes to carry the main melody, is ask them to repeat and variate certain sentences.

Say this one:

It's beautiful. 

Now ask them to play it in 3/4 or 6/8 or one octave lower etc.

I hope this helps.

You know what, I actually do want you to review a piece of mine.

Just give it a listen and tell me your general opinion,

of course I'd appreciate some helpful criticism but it's not done yet.

I'll send it to you privately in a moment.

It's a very interesting piece. The way the voices come together has a nice effect, although as @Rabbival507 says, it could become too chaotic and lose the gentle morning effect. Your flute phrases are varied and interesting although repeated, and as a flute player they would come 'under the fingers' very well.

Well done on a great piece!

First of all, I’m sorry it took me a few days to get to this.  C’est la vie!   

What a nice piece!  Beautiful chords and sonorities, particularly in the slower sections.  I realize you’re intending flutes to play the “bird calls” part of the piece (not heard here), but I think the accompaniment now in the strings might sound even better with a slightly larger orchestra – a few winds, maybe a few brass, to add even more colour.    

I wish I had more advice to give you about the overall sound being clamourous with all the part there, but I’m not very good at dealing with the vagaries of electronic playback in my own work, and am seldom completely satisfied.  Good luck working with that.