Mirrorscape

Mirrorscape is a jazz ballad for an advanced high school or college level jazz ensemble (grade 4+). It brings out the lushness of timbre and an energetic working double-time section. Tenor saxophone and trumpet are featured here bringing beautiful tone colors to the mix.

It's a nice sound generally, though the use of parallel close dissonances throws me off somewhat, especially in the beginning.

I think it has a nice Ennio Morricone feel to it. Driving beat, interesting harmonies, stirring chord progressions—enough to keep a jazz ensemble interested. Easy listening. Great job!

1) You need to put chord changes on the piano part and bass part.  That's normal for the rhythm section so it gives them the freedom to switch it up when they need to.  You would also need to do the same thing for the soloists.  For a jazz piece, always have an improv section.

2) The drum part is too much.   I know you did that for the MIDI but a drummer, a GREAT drummer doesnt need all that.  Just put Funk ballad and the style and maybe a simple pattern.  It's very convoluted to read otherwise.  

3) Interesting orchestration. 4 trpts and 5 trombones are not the norm.  You can get away with 5 and 4, even 5 and 5,  but 4 and 5 is a rarity.  Then on top of that, you have a tenor soloist on top of 5 saxes with another trumpet soloist. Now you need 6 saxes.   I would scale back to use standard instrumentation.   Now, if this is for a specific group, then fine. 

@Locrian7th  just my $0.02

First, thank you for listening and commenting down. It really does help. I’ve done a lot of revisions with this (from the instrumentation down to the notation) 

@maestrowick What you suggested was mainly all the points I had to revise. 
Though, it is still a work in progress, the full score does look a bit easier to follow now.

Thank you all again,

-SP

Just now, Locrian7th said:

First, thank you for listening and commenting down. It really does help. I’ve done a lot of revisions with this (from the instrumentation down to the notation) 

@maestrowick What you suggested was mainly all the points I had to revise. 
Though, it is still a work in progress, the full score does look a bit easier to follow now.

Thank you all again,

-SP

 

No problem.  I would love to see the updated score!

Hi Locrian7..   Nice piece, I really love when the song picks up. Although I'm not versed in Band arrangements, I composed written, produced mostly pop for a long time.  Sonically the beginning feels somewhat 'bottom heavy for quite a while.  I greatly appreciate the score.   Monarcheon and  Maestrowick certainly covered all the points.  Well done.  Perhaps the close disonance should remove quicker.  in the beginning riffs.  The interplay of motifs is very nice.