"The Calamity" - Kyle Hilton (UncleRed99) [[Finally did a new piece... Couldn't get my head out of the last two...]]

Here's a new score (Finally). 
Written for String Quintet x Piano. Wrote it as a representation of how tense things are in the world nowadays. The mystery of not really knowing where things will go, from here. The rhythm / pulse throughout the piece signifies the ever-long march of time, that no one can run away from. Time that we all are limited in. The key change to A minor at the return to the motif signifies a slight feeling of hope among the tension, I feel, currently, in that I hope that things will become more bearable as time moves forward. Hope y'all enjoy this one. (I may or may not make updates to it, periodically, for the next couple weeks. Y'all know how I be at this point... lolol but I feel this one is as done as I can make it, at this moment.)

The Calamity.pdf

Hey @UncleRed99!

Glad to see/hear that you've finally moved on to a new piece!  I think the proper name for a string quintet + piano combination would be "Piano Sextet".  Traditionally for example, a duet of Violin and Cello with Piano is called a "Piano Trio", a trio of Violin, Viola and Cello with Piano would be a "Piano Quartet" and a quartet of 2 Violins, Viola, Cello with Piano would be a "Piano Quintet".  So I'm just extrapolating that this would be a "Piano Sextet" based on those naming conventions.  I'll address a few things that bothered me about the score before actually talking about the music:

There's a few things to note here.  First, when writing pizzicato strings, you don't need to add a staccato marking for the pizzicato.  It's redundant considering that pizzicato is already a very percussive and separated effect.  Also, you have the Bartok pizzicato at mf, followed by a regular pizzicato at forte.  That doesn't really make sense considering that Bartok pizzicato is achieved by snapping the string as hard as possible so that it hits the fingerboard.  The Bartok pizzicato would naturally have to be louder than the regular pizzicato just by the nature of the effect.  Also, there's a special symbol for Bartok pizzicato that string players recognize:  I think it would be more concise to use this symbol.

 Here you have the indication to play legato contradicted by the separated 8th notes.  If you want the player to cancel their pizzicato playing and return to bowing you can put "arco" or "ord.".

Now about the music.  The first thing I noticed is that this is a very quiet piece.  I had to listen to it on my Bluetooth speaker to really hear it better.  But I think the problem is also that when the piano is playing the melody alone without the support of the strings, the piano melody is often simply inaudible above the accompaniment.  Especially the grace notes are lost because they go by so quickly.  The way to counteract that is to of course use MS Basic soundfonts for the piano so you can bring out the melody in high relief by using higher velocity values for those notes (which you can edit in the "properties" tab).  Unfortunately, the Musesounds samples don't currently respond to velocity changes so you'd be forced to use the MS Basic soundfont for piano.  But imo (since I do this all the time) I think the clarity of the melodic line is to me a much more sought after commodity in music than the supposedly "better" sounding Musesound sample.  But that might be just me.

Overall, I like the melancholy vibe of the piece!  The only thing that bothers me is that the key changes seem to be inserted into the piece just for their own sake.  And the modulations should be led by the melody for them to make audible sense and create a more breathtaking effect.  Thanks for sharing!

6 hours ago, PeterthePapercomPoser said:

Hey @UncleRed99!

Glad to see/hear that you've finally moved on to a new piece!  I think the proper name for a string quintet + piano combination would be "Piano Sextet".  Traditionally for example, a duet of Violin and Cello with Piano is called a "Piano Trio", a trio of Violin, Viola and Cello with Piano would be a "Piano Quartet" and a quartet of 2 Violins, Viola, Cello with Piano would be a "Piano Quintet".  So I'm just extrapolating that this would be a "Piano Sextet" based on those naming conventions.  I'll address a few things that bothered me about the score before actually talking about the music:

There's a few things to note here.  First, when writing pizzicato strings, you don't need to add a staccato marking for the pizzicato.  It's redundant considering that pizzicato is already a very percussive and separated effect.  Also, you have the Bartok pizzicato at mf, followed by a regular pizzicato at forte.  That doesn't really make sense considering that Bartok pizzicato is achieved by snapping the string as hard as possible so that it hits the fingerboard.  The Bartok pizzicato would naturally have to be louder than the regular pizzicato just by the nature of the effect.  Also, there's a special symbol for Bartok pizzicato that string players recognize:  I think it would be more concise to use this symbol.

 Here you have the indication to play legato contradicted by the separated 8th notes.  If you want the player to cancel their pizzicato playing and return to bowing you can put "arco" or "ord.".

Now about the music.  The first thing I noticed is that this is a very quiet piece.  I had to listen to it on my Bluetooth speaker to really hear it better.  But I think the problem is also that when the piano is playing the melody alone without the support of the strings, the piano melody is often simply inaudible above the accompaniment.  Especially the grace notes are lost because they go by so quickly.  The way to counteract that is to of course use MS Basic soundfonts for the piano so you can bring out the melody in high relief by using higher velocity values for those notes (which you can edit in the "properties" tab).  Unfortunately, the Musesounds samples don't currently respond to velocity changes so you'd be forced to use the MS Basic soundfont for piano.  But imo (since I do this all the time) I think the clarity of the melodic line is to me a much more sought after commodity in music than the supposedly "better" sounding Musesound sample.  But that might be just me.

Overall, I like the melancholy vibe of the piece!  The only thing that bothers me is that the key changes seem to be inserted into the piece just for their own sake.  And the modulations should be led by the melody for them to make audible sense and create a more breathtaking effect.  Thanks for sharing!

 

Thanks, as per usual, for your detailed feedback! 
 

In regards to the pizz. Staccatos, I was under the impression that it was acceptable to use for Cb. And Cll. Parts, but not for Viola & Violins? At least, that’s what I was taught in my year of college when doing extra curricular arrangements with the theory professor. But yall tend to be much more wise than I at this stuff 😅 I was never really strings-oriented and am mostly self taught so I’ll take that into account for sure. 
 

I was also unaware that there was a specific marking for Bartok! 
 

the “mf” for the bartok section was mostly for the playback. In hindsight I should’ve made that marking invisible to correct for its implausible use, IRL. 
 

I agree, the piano also should stick out a bit more. The sound used for the piano and for the viola come from the Spitfire LABS VST3 plugin. I can optimize it to be a bit louder in the left hand, using a hidden staff, similar as to how I achieved that in the original playback for “Remembrance”. 
 

and as far as the key change goes, 

I thought the use of the Neapolitan chord modulation provided a pleasantly unexpected movement in that section during the mod. To A minor. What would you suggest in that section to maybe smooth it out a bit more? I’ll admit I had trouble figuring out where to take it and how to move it more seamlessly to A minor. 😅 I’m not a modulation Guru, but have been lucky in some instances where while writing, the modulation ended up just working on its own without much effort based on what I wrote prior to it. My process is a bit unorthodox in honesty, since I’m fairly un-trained with composing, mostly working off of my own ear. 
 

thanks Peter!

9 hours ago, UncleRed99 said:

In regards to the pizz. Staccatos, I was under the impression that it was acceptable to use for Cb. And Cll. Parts, but not for Viola & Violins? At least, that’s what I was taught in my year of college when doing extra curricular arrangements with the theory professor.

This is the first I've ever heard of this practice, but by all means, your education is probably more recent than mine!  LoL

9 hours ago, UncleRed99 said:

I thought the use of the Neapolitan chord modulation provided a pleasantly unexpected movement in that section during the mod. To A minor. What would you suggest in that section to maybe smooth it out a bit more? I’ll admit I had trouble figuring out where to take it and how to move it more seamlessly to A minor. 😅 I’m not a modulation Guru, but have been lucky in some instances where while writing, the modulation ended up just working on its own without much effort based on what I wrote prior to it. My process is a bit unorthodox in honesty, since I’m fairly un-trained with composing, mostly working off of my own ear.

Are you referring to the Eb Neapolitan chord in meas. 33?  I actually thought that chord brought the "more hopeful" feeling you were trying to target in the A minor section.  The way I approach modulation is also a bit unorthodox.  I don't usually target a specific key to modulate to - I just let the music modulate wherever it feels like it should.  There was one time that I modulated to a completely random key by rolling a 12-sided musician's die.  LoL  I thought it actually worked out quite well.  I don't think your modulation is that un-smooth in this case - after all, A minor and D minor are closely related keys, being right next to each other on the circle of fifths, it shouldn't be difficult to get to one from the other.  But I think, perhaps the harmonic rhythm and the timing of the modulation was a bit too predictable?  That's my hunch.  But don't feel compelled to change it just based on my hunch - if you want to experiment with it, perhaps doubling the harmonic rhythm of the chords of the modulation would inject some excitement into it?  Those are my thoughts.