Your dear beauty lovelier still

Hi all,

My entry for the "From Nothing, to Something" Summer 2026 Composition Competition is a short mixed quintet called "Your dear beauty lovelier still".

This was definitely the most challenging piece I have made: making something from nothing was by far the hardest thing I have done so far here.

I couldn't find anything that would represent summer apart from giving this song the lyrics of the poem this competition is based on (Donc, ce sera par un clair jour d'été).

Btw, since Musescore doesn't have any soundfonts that can sing lyrics, you won't be able to hear the lyrics in the audio.

Here is the pdf

I hope you enjoy 😁

Edited August 24Aug 24 by Musicman_3254

Entry: "Your Daer Beauty lovelier"

total51.5/80

Average Score:6.4

Review:

Melodic material: Cello line, which carries the melody, is even balanced. It introduces the main theme of the piece that is sung in baritone voice. However, we can't hear baritone signing the melody for the other instruments are overshadowing it. It would nice if instruments would drop out when the male voice is signing. Or giving a lighter texture. or only have one or two playing. This is paramount when writing for voice and orchestra.

Score prep, instrumentation, playability. : There are several issues with the score. The hairpins are not readable with in the harp part; the bliss is not connected; solo indicators when you only instrument per player. Solo is used in strings where there is more than one player per part, and the composers wants only player to play. Holst did this in Venus. When he wanted to signal a solo player in the string section, he marked "solo". For the areas, where the solo is marked, it is preferred not to have the other instruments playing. This is applicable for oboe part, too. The held note in the reeds is not ideal. When you are writing for wood instruments, you have to remember, that need to breathe. Because there is no phrase markings in the cello part, the bowing will change on every note. I feel you can add more depth here. The triple stop at the end is incredible hard to play. You have wrote out the range of the Oboe'd natural range. In fact, that instrument is no longer in use. It is not in balance with the rest of the ensemble. The harp writing is unrealistic and lacks proper study. This score needs a serious revision on this front!

Execution: Yes, this piece has met the core requirements for this competition. However, the overall mood just seems off.

Creativity: this is indeed and creative and orginal piece.

Form and time: It was difficult to what the proper formal structure of the composition was, and the timing was slow.

Harmony and textures; Overall, the piece is mainly diatonic. There are moments of other modes with in the piece. The piece has colorful textures.

Side note: Cantai can be used with Musescore.

Lovely melody and textures. Particularly the vocal line.

I’m not entirely convinced by the final section; the high notes sound too loud.

My main comment is about the harp – oh, the harp!

There’s no indication whatsoever of initial pedal positions or changes. This isn’t mandatory, though personally, one should have it checked. There are things you simply can’t do, such as this:

On the other hand, the harp part is notated by placing each note on the nearest of the two staves. But the correct way to do it, I believe, is to write on the upper stave what the upper hand plays and on the lower stave what the lower hand plays, bearing in mind that the groups (in passages that aren’t slow) consist of four notes per hand.

Huge arpeggiated chords are also impossible to play if they’re fast. If it’s an effect where each note of the arpeggio follows the next slowly, then yes. But at that speed, it’s impossible. Each hand can cover a maximum of a tenth and four notes per hand. The chords must be simplified to that (or use two harps?).

There are also some very questionable chords:

The harp is a complicated instrument and you can’t think of it as if it were a piano.

Saludos.

On 8/26/2026 at 3:38 PM, Kvothe said:

Side note: Cantai can be used with Musescore.

Although Cantai works with Musescore, the lyrics I used are in French and Cantai only works with English and Latin lyrics

Edited August 29Aug 29 by Musicman_3254

I agree with @Luis Hernández on the harp writing. That is not possible. The chords are too large for a single hand to play. This is why you need to look at scores that have harp parts in them. I can not emphasize this enough...score study is paramount.

A lovely pleasant piece of music. Remember woodwind players need to Breathe! Why the Oboe D'amore? Not many players own one.

Why not substitute English Horn? I also think in this composition the tone would be more fitting.

Mark

As a pianist, those chords also impossible to play. Not even Rachmoninov would have wrote chords in that fashion! I think you need to carefully look at scores that use the harp, @Musicman_3254.

Adler provided some scores to look at (and I included others)

• CPE Harp Sonata

• Caplet's Deux Divertissements

• Debussy's Sonata for harp, flute, and viola

• Belioz's "Rob Roy"

• The planets by Gustav Holst

• Pines of Rome by Ottorino Respighi

it’s a good piece, but I have some suggestions about logistics and playability and all that stuff

Octaves with harps I’m not a harpest. I’m pretty sure you may have to watch out if you’re going to be playing octave runs on one hand. Well, I have done with my competition piece. “ on pastel skies” that I have written for mallets with octave runs that are split in between hands as double verticals. So one hand would play the center note in the octave above in the left hand would play the center note in the octave below. just some stuff to watch out for.

Also for cello’s and I don’t think so, but possibly for baritone as well you should use tenor clef rather than alto clef

and also, I saw what you did with the implementation of the oboe d amore

anyways, another thing I would point out is near the end with the pentatonic sounding thing was a little too loud. Honestly, this was good writing. You just chose the wrong dynamic. It would fit better more smooth at a forte or something a little lower

melody 8.7

Harmony 6.8

Form and structure 7

Creativity 4.78

Engraving 6.5

Orchestration and playability 6

execution 8

Taste 7.5

average is 6.91

The reason why your creativity originality score is tanked is due to similar title with other scores in this competition and also simply putting the name of the competition as a title

However, though you must acknowledge that your execution score, unless if some miraculous magic happened, would also get tanked if you tried thinking outside of the box so it’s kind of a sacrifice unless if you know what you absolutely are doing.

Edited September 7Sep 7 by Fruit hunter

Avg: 8.43

Very nice relaxing theme, which was clear throughout the piece. Your form / structure was easy to follow, and this made the listening experience very enjoyable. I think you nailed the challenge with the mood. Aside from feeling serenity and peace, it reminds me of a night summer afternoon with a cool breeze. Your audio is great, and your usage of dynamics really bring out your music! Overall it's a very beautiful piece, short enough where the harmony isn't too much of an issue, but any longer, we'd need some changes in key in my opinion. This is why I marked you down with harmony. When harmony doesn't really change key, the music risks starting to sound like a hymn.

Hello @Musicman_3254 !

The piece has (at the beginning) a very calming character and is somewhat reminiscent of a fairy tale movie (especially one you’d watch in winter during the Christmas season) or—once the vocals come in— of @PeterthePapercomPoser’s Christmas mashup from last year. 😂

Just when one is (almost) fallen asleep (around 03:11, measure 102), you’re instantly jolted awake by the staccatos of the harp and cello, as well as the blood-curdling trill of the flute, which sounds like a piercing birdcall—perhaps that of a cockatiel.

Melodies Themes Motives and Harmony Chords Textures:

The piece is based on a memorable melody, reminiscent of a lullaby, which recurs repeatedly in the treble instruments (i.e., flute and oboe d’amore) as well as in the baritone voice. This contrasts with accompanying textures, chords, and arpeggios, which are played largely by the harp.

While the song maintains a diatonic harmony throughout all three verses, the coda appears to be somewhat different, with a pentatonic impression.

Form Development Structure Time:

The form of the piece could be that of a song with three verses and a coda. As mentioned above, the verses unfold in a pleasant and calming manner, with the accompaniment employing various textures without losing that character, only to be turned into the exact opposite in the coda.

Originality Creativity:

The originality of the piece arises on the one hand from the contrast of the calming song and the surprising end, as well as from the instrumentation, combining two melody instruments, a human voice and two more or less accompanying and percussive instruments together.

Score Presentation:

The notation for the vocal part—that is, the baritone staff—is somewhat inconsistent regarding the use of slurs and beams:

In vocal score notation it is important to distinguish whether a single syllable is represented by a single note or whether multiple notes are sung for a single syllable (i.e., a melisma). There are two possibilities:

• In older, classical scores eighths and sixteenth notes are notated with flags (not beamed) for a single syllable, but if there are multiple notes to be sung for a single syllable, those notes are beamed together. No slurs at all (except for quarter or longer notes).

• In contemporary music, beams are used to show the rhythmic pattern, regardless of the text. However, in that case slurs indicate whenever multiple notes should be sung for a single syllable (and nowhere else).

For example, there should be no slurs in measures 18–19, since each note has its own syllable, whereas the slur in measures 62–64a is correct, since all the notes are sung on a single syllable.

As for clefs, I believe that a vocal score for baritone uses the standard bass clef, and the cello in its middle/high register uses the tenor clef (and neither uses the alto clef).

One more minor point: You forgot to remove rests from some measures on the high staff of the harp (for example, in measures 32–42).

Instrumentation Orchestration Playability:

The choice of the instruments is effectively used to achieve the mood and effect of the piece. However, there are a number of concerns on the playability – as already mentioned by other reviewers, especially in the harp part.

Execution of Given Challenge:

You have set the poem to music and, therefore, created a relation to the given challenge. However, my personal—and therefore subjective—impressions evoke associations with winter rather than summer, though I could be completely wrong—perhaps I’m being influenced by today’s cold weather at the start of fall.

Taste:

I like this piece because of the humorous contrast between calm and scare.

Average Score: 7.5

Hi Musicbro, (funny name! lol)
I have been in the process of doing my reviews for this competition and I have finally made my way here! Attached is a pdf of some annotations. They are mostly surface level, with most of the comments on engraving and the notation. So, without delay, let's begin!

ENGRAVING:
You have a lot of engraving errors, from the use of wrong clefs, to rest errors, note placements, dynamic information and more. Please see the attached pdf at the end for the specific places in the score. A lot of other users have mentioned the harp and trust what they say. I have also marked some comments on the harp and I would refer to the harp comments as above. I am also linking this video which is my brief explainer on the harp.

MUSIC:
My main issue with the music is it's minimalism. There is one melody stated in the cello that gets passed around, yet the accompaniment stays pretty tame while the harp goes brrr. The ensemble is unbalanced and there is no clear sense of melodic structure outside the use of a phrase. To fix, creating the sense of variety or establishing roles in the ensemble would be my suggestion (Cello = bass support, Harp = Flourish, Winds = Accompaniment, Baritone = Melody). Thinking this way may help the coherency of the piece. Truth be told, it feels more like a harp concerto/ concertina versus an established chamber piece.

I am limited on time and cannot provide a super detailed analysis, however good work on this piece and we'll be eager to see what you create in the future!

M. Bro - Your dear beauty lovelier still [ANNOTATED].pdf

Hi @Musicman_3254 !

I quite like the pentatonic language and the ending some very Chinese to me! But like @MK_Piano noted the piece can be more varied in terms instrumentation. More interactions between the instruments can be added and variation of textures with some more polyphony would be good. Now the piece is predominantly homophonic and sometimes heterophonic.

Another thing is the change of harmony and keys. The music is mostly in Gb major with pentatonic setting which makes the piece sounds a bit monotomous and not moving forward becauase of lack of conflict and drama and dissonance (disclaimer: I love the key and setting since I exactly use the same setting for my Sextet in Gb major!!!!!).

Apart from the harp issue, for the instrumentation I'm not sure the wind player can play the opening notes that long unless they have circular breathing technique. For the harp players playing glissando is a deafult, so in passages like in b.43 you should rather notate "non-arpeggio".

For the score presentation, Cello never uses alto clef but you use it right at the beginning and many later passages!. For strings only viola uses alto clef. Cello only uses Bass, Tenor and Treble clef! Also I think Baritone wil prefer bass clef to alto clef.

Thx for sharing!

Henry

On 8/24/2026 at 1:23 PM, Musicman_3254 said:

This was definitely the most challenging piece I have made: making something from nothing was by far the hardest thing I have done so far here.

Whether you win or lose the competition, saying this means you actually won something much better.

You know, I've read through everyone's comments, and a lot of what others have said about wind breathing, harp writing, orchestration, etc. all holds true. Take note of it; it's free advice that if applied will help you improve.

BUT

Your style, your voice, your raw talent that you're hopefully always going to keep working on was really fun and a treat to listen to. Your music is emotional and definitely applicable to the poem. I really really love how you treated the vocals (cool to incorporate vocals btw!). There were large gaps between the phrases, and I think that lead to a balanced feel of it all. You gave solos to the different instruments, letting them all sing on their own and together when necessary. Even though I think the winds could have been fleshed out more and the harp used more effectively, the point is you TRIED and branched out from your comfort zone to compose this piece. You hopefully learned a lot, and with the feedback you've gotten you're more equipped with technique for future pieces.

This was definitely one of my favorites so far for the reasons stated. Well done sir, you should be very proud of this piece :)

Hi @Musicman_3254

Really beautiful entry to this competition. I loved the music to this piece, a lot of my thoughts are on cleaning up the score and parts so that they are more legible and effective.

Some engraving thoughts:

• make sure the first full system of the score includes all instruments and their full names (even if resting)

• hide bar rests in the harp part if you are writing cross-staff

• for the opening, use hairpins instead of the cres. and dim. lines

• solo marking for instruments is extraneous

• octaves in the harp (mm15-17) would be better read on two staves as one hand would play each note

• clefs:

  • none of these instruments should use alto clef

    • cello should only ever be in bass, tenor, and treble clefs

    • baritone should always be in bass clef

  • never use octave clefs for a non octave transposing instrument

    • harp m51 - use an ottava line instead

• key signature

  • Gb is a lot of flats, it works great for the harp though

  • I might be tempted to leave the harp in Gb and notate the flute/cello/voice in F# major, but unsure if it would be any better

• put slurs on the grace notes and connect them to their primary note

• not sure what purpose the marking in the cello part in m59 serves

• don't let dynamics or other text cut into barlines unless you really need them to (m86 flute)

• make sure trill lines extend to their last note (mm102-104 oboe)

• large harp chords - use one arpeggio line across both staves; don't need the up arrow arpeggio line unless you're going in both directions

Some playability thoughts:

• I saw lots of comments above about the playability of the harp part, but I didn't read all of them. None of the harp part is currently technically impossible, but here are my thoughts to make it easier on the player.

  • the Dnat to flat ped change (m20 and m101) is totally fine and doable. There's plenty of time for the player to flip the pedal to natural and back to flat - you might hear a little bit of noise, but it's unlikely. This is also the only pedal change in the piece, so I'm sure they'll manage.

  • the cross staff arpeggios at the beginning are wonderful, adding in doubled notes in mm5-14 is difficult and likely not worth the additional amount of sound that will be created. I would suggest either start up the octave and bring it down an octave for more resonance in m12.

  • on a similar note, any passage which immediately repeats the same note is challenging on the harp, as it required the player to mute the string and then pluck it again

  • my thoughts on the large chords - again technically possible, it's just asking a lot and is quite fast. The player would alternate hands to play across the entire harp, so get rid of two arpeggio lines and put one big one across both staves. The tempo is likely too fast to play all the notes, it will also be too loud at the dynamics you have marked. Save the big arpeggiated chords for one per bar at most and make sure you really want to volume of so many strings sounding at once.

  • A trill on the harp (m86) doesn't always work well. I would switch the pedal so that it's a bisbigl. between G# and Ab.

• The flute part is very low. I would not have it written to sound lower than the oboe damore. Even the very beginning I would switch the pitches or bring the flute part up the octave.

• Curious as to why you chose the oboe damore. It's an uncommon instrument and very, very few players have it. The range doesn't call for it either, as it all fits nicely in the range of the traditional oboe.

• The oboe does not dim. to nothing effectively. m72 and similar places will be difficult

• The cello range is too demanding of the player. High Gbs and Bbs at the dynamic level you have asked for is impossible. Bring it down one or two octaves. mm53-59 is confusing as well, it's very high and the ppp dim marking makes it seem like you don't want it to be heard

• Not all of the cello doublestops in mm59-71 are possible. The Gb and Ab dyad is a real stretch. ( I wonder if the entire piece could be transposed up a half step and you could use open strings?)

Some text-setting thoughts:

• Lovely, lovely use of the voice. I also set the poem as an art song and I really love your rendition of it here.

• I know there are different house styles, but I would only use slurs to show syllable melismata or very long phrases.

• I love the stress of the first phrase, but make sure that important words are highlighted on the beat

• Make sure word divider lines (-) are not causing collisions with the text

Average Score: 8.125