Summer – A Song of Beauty and Melancholy – Submission to the YCF 2026 Summer Competition

Dear fellow composers, I’m pleased to present you today my submission to the YCF 2026 Summer Competition!

I must admit, that the task of the competition was really challenging, starting from „Nothing“ and than get the right ideas for „Something“ that is reminiscent to the mood of the summer day as expressed by Paul Verlaine’s poem.

The challenge.

When a composer has trouble coming up with a brilliant idea for a new piece, it sometimes takes several attempts, each of which yields different individual ideas.

And there are some pieces that consist of several ideas that have been “glued” together, ultimately resulting in something like a “collage song.” I’m thinking, for example, of “A Day in the Life” by the Beatles or “Band on the Run” by Paul McCartney and Wings.

However, there also exists such a kind of piece in Bach’s Welltempered Clavier, the Prelude VII in E-flat major, BWV 852. That particular prelude starts with a short section with runs of 32th notes, followed by a „more serious“ part in slow motion, that reminds me at a „chorale“. The third and longest part is a fugato with two subjects that further develops the ideas from the first two sections.

So with this particular Bach prelude in mind, I had thus found the model for my own prelude, which serves as the „sketch“ for the quintet finally presented here as my submission. I always start to compose the pieces for piano in order to – on the one hand, have another piece for my preludes and fugues project, and on the other hand, because I find it to hard to mix the two phases of „composing“ and „orchestrating“ together.

So I have posted the piano version as a standalone piece "Prelude XXI in B flat major" on the „Piano Music, Solo Keyboard“ thread.

The poem.

When I came around to the second part, the “Chorale” section, I faced the challenge of treating the upper voice of this four-part harmony as the melody for a musical setting of the poem.

Since I don’t speak a word of French and have no idea how the syllables are rhythmicized, I looked at Gabriel Fauré’s setting of the poem in his Op. 61, No. 7 to find out which words are pronounced or sung briefly and which are longer. As an interesting fact, I discovered that Fauré had actually chosen the same key, B-flat major, that I had chosen before.

The instrumentation.

Now that the decision had been made to set the poem to music, I wondered how I could orchestrate it so that it would sound like a French “chanson.” My first thought was to choose the accordion as the main accompanying instrument. And since I wasn’t sure, I Googled: “What are the typical accompanying instruments for a French chanson?”—and sure enough, “accordion,” “guitar,” and “piano” came up.

In addition to these, and to take advantage of the possibility of a quintet, I use a trumpet and a cello. Both of these instruments are capable of contributing different timbres (the cello either played with a bow or pizzicato, and the trumpet either muted or unmuted), and during the poem stanzas, I always use the muted trumpet as a substitute for the human voice.

The title.

Another challenge. A title in French would be appropriate, but I do not really trust translation programs in such delicate situations, since I don’t understand the nuances of the possible result. Thus, I’ve chosen the simple title „Summer – A Song of Beauty and Melancholy“. The latter since the piece features more passages in minor than in major and, therefore, does not only express the joy and beauty of the summer day, but is somewhat melancholic, too.

Form and structure:

00:00 (mm. 1-14)

The first section is an „improvisation“ which introduces the warm key of B-flat major.

00:34 (mm. 15-29)

The second Adagio section could be a „chorale“ and is used to set the first stanza of the poem to music.

01:31 (mm. 30-90)

The third and longest section is a fugato based on two subjects, interspersed by further stanzas of the poem (second stanza 02:18 at mm. 48-63 and third stanza 03:37 at mm. 75-90).

The first subject quotes the first four-note motif of the „improvisation“ section and develops it further, paired with the second subject, thus creating a joyful and dance-like mood.

04:22 (mm. 91-114)

The piece finishes with a coda – or better to say – with a recapitulation of the „improvisation“ from the first section. Now in a more melancholic way, meandering between minor and major.

I hope, you’ll enjoy it. Wieland

Finally, as a kind of „non-AI proof“ I also attached my „working score“ from which the MIDI is generated. It is nearly unreadable and of cause not intended for playing but shows in detail all dynamics, articulations, agogics etc. I applied to achieve the final recording.

Praeludium-XXI-B-flat-major-accordion-with-coversheet.pdf WORKING-SCORE-P21.pdf