The Old Man and the Sea

This is my latest piece, created based on Hemingway's "The Old Man and the Sea". I write various types of music that may be in demand primarily in the film industry, for soundtracks. If anyone is interested, please write to me. My music is also released on vinyl records.

1.⁠ ⁠Overture 00:00

2.⁠ ⁠The Old Man and the Boy 03:19

3.⁠ ⁠Hope 06:54

4.⁠ ⁠The Fish 10:56

5.⁠ ⁠The Sharks 12:24

6.⁠ ⁠Despair 14:22

7.⁠ ⁠Unbroken, Dreaming of Lions 15:57

Edited Tuesday at 09:34 PM1 day by Mamuka Chkheidze

Hello @Mamuka Chkheidze and welcome to the forum!

Do you have a score of this piece? It would help greatly to allow us to review it! Thanks!

3 hours ago, PeterthePapercomPoser said:

Привет@Mamuka ChkheidzeДобро пожаловать на форум!

У вас есть партитура этого произведения? Было бы очень полезно, если бы вы позволили нам ознакомиться с ней! Спасибо!

Of course I have one. I work in Studio One with MIDI files, and I can print out the score as well. This evening I'll export an excerpt and drop it in here

.

Edited 19 hours ago19 hr by Mamuka Chkheidze

9 hours ago, PeterthePapercomPoser said:

Привет@Mamuka ChkheidzeДобро пожаловать на форум!

У вас есть партитура этого произведения? Было бы очень полезно, если бы вы позволили нам ознакомиться с ней! Спасибо!

“This is the score for the first movement (the overture). Please note that the strings are not divided into first and second violins, violas, and cellos (that is, in the table they are printed under a single name and given together, because technically I don’t need that at this stage, before a live orchestra performs it). Also, for example, there are two harps because they are recorded on different tracks, so that when I use the faders the sound comes out the way I want. For example, I also haven’t set up the alto clef (viola clef), and so on. And naturally, there is a lot of work to be done in the program to separate out the faders, which I also don’t need at this stage, before there is a live orchestra, and so on. In short, this is practically just the notation score.

What’s more... I live in Georgia, and everything I’m writing now, I’m writing with Google Translate, because I practically don’t know English. If Google translated anything in a confusing way, I apologize on its behalf :)”

The old man and the sea.pdf

Hi Mr. Chkheidze, welcome to our forums.

The overture sounds wonderful, as well as the second movement, but I was revising the score of the first movement you submitted and I see that it gets cut off. In the last page (78) you can see it clearly. I suppose that it goes attacca but if it does, I have no way to know just from the score alone. It seems like the movement does not finish there. My suggestion —in case it was cut off— would be trying to export it as A3 or even bigger paper so there's enough space. It's true that even in that case, it's not easy to follow a score of such dimension. If this was not cut off, I would suggest a double bar at the end or a double final bar, marking "attacca subito" if you intend to keep going to the second movement without pause. Maybe you do know about this, but just in case!

That you release this (or the final, recorded product, I suppose) in Vinyl is surprising to me, just as a note. Is it costly?


Now on the piece itself, I would say that you have a lot of ideas, and you sure know how to make bombastic stuff that could fit very well in a soundtrack. I normally listen to the works twice or thrice before emitting some judgement, because often a single listen is not enough for me to grasp enough details or places I would like to stop and comment. While writing this comment I'm listening to the work for the second time and as I progress in the piece I see that this great music you have brought us may err on the side of excess, in my humble opinion.

Excess of bombastic fortissimo moments, of tutti, of fast contrasts, and of lack of elements that would make the piece be perceived as a whole. Of course, there are very good transitions too, like the one you do from movement 2 to movement 3, and a whole lot of enjoyable moments, but I don't really get the impression of listening to a cohesive multi-movemented work, but at well crafted environments or atmospheres, or even excerpts of music that do share instrumentation in common and that would, as you suggest, work as part of some cinematic product.

There is, in my opinion again, A LOT of material here that could be further developed to make a whole suite of itself.

Finally, I hope the translator doesn't fail. My favourite part of this work is undoubtedly the clarinet solo part on movement 7. It reminded me a lot of "E lucevan le stelle" from Puccini https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YAXE-lczgu4

Many thanks for submitting your work here.

Best regards,
Daniel–Ø.

10 hours ago, Omicronrg9 said:

Здравствуйте, господин Чхейдзе, добро пожаловать на наш форум.

Увертюра звучит замечательно, как и вторая часть, но я перечитывал партитуру первой части, которую вы прислали, и вижу, что она обрывается. На последней странице (78) это хорошо видно. Я предполагаю, что она переходит в «attacca subito», но если это так, я не могу определить это только по партитуре. Кажется, что часть на этом не заканчивается. Мое предложение — на случай, если она обрывается — попробовать экспортировать ее на бумаге формата A3 или даже большего размера, чтобы было достаточно места. Правда, даже в этом случае нелегко следить за партитурой такого размера. Если же она не обрывается, я бы предложил добавить двойную тактовую черту в конце или двойную заключительную тактовую черту, обозначающую «attacca subito», если вы намерены продолжать вторую часть без паузы. Возможно, вы знаете об этом, но на всякий случай! Меня удивляет

, что вы выпускаете это (или, я полагаю, окончательный вариант записи) на виниле, просто к слову. Это дорого?


Что касается самого произведения, я бы сказал, что у вас много идей, и вы, безусловно, умеете создавать помпезные вещи, которые отлично подошли бы для саундтрека. Обычно я слушаю ваши работы два или три раза, прежде чем выносить какое-либо суждение, потому что часто одного прослушивания недостаточно, чтобы уловить достаточно деталей или моментов, которые я хотел бы отметить. Сейчас, когда я пишу этот комментарий, я слушаю произведение во второй раз, и по мере того, как я продвигаюсь по нему, я понимаю, что эта великолепная музыка, которую вы нам подарили, на мой скромный взгляд, может быть немного избыточной.

Избыток помпезных моментов фортиссимо, тутти, быстрых контрастов и недостаток элементов, которые позволили бы воспринимать произведение как единое целое. Конечно, есть и очень хорошие переходы, например, тот, что вы делаете от второй части к третьей, и множество приятных моментов, но у меня не складывается впечатления, что я слушаю цельное многочастное произведение, скорее это хорошо продуманные музыкальные фрагменты или даже отрывки музыки, которые имеют общую инструментальную структуру и которые, как вы предполагаете, могли бы подойти для какого-нибудь кинематографического произведения.

На мой взгляд, здесь снова ОЧЕНЬ много материала, который можно было бы развить в целую сюиту.

Наконец, я надеюсь, что переводчик не подведет. Моя любимая часть этого произведения — это, несомненно, сольная партия кларнета в седьмой части. Она очень напомнила мне «E lucevan le stelle» Пуччини https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YAXE-lczgu4

Большое спасибо за то, что вы представили свою работу здесь.

С наилучшими пожеланиями ,
Даниэль-О.

Hello. First of all, thank you very much for liking my piece. For any composer, the most important thing is that the energy and the part of the soul that the author wove into the work reach the listener. I’ll try to answer your questions.

1. I don’t work in Sibelius. I work in Studio One with MIDI files (whether I build the music artificially or play it by hand on the keyboard makes no difference here, since the MIDI files are recorded on the screen). So when I was asked for the score, I had the program print out part of it. It is only a copy of the notes and contains no other musical markings. I haven’t needed to prepare this piece for a live orchestra yet, as it is a brand-new work. Of course this is not the final score. It will need a great deal of work when (if) it is prepared for an orchestra rehearsal. That’s why I don’t have the strings split out by individual instrument, and so on. So please don’t be too hard on me about it. Think of it as a rough draft of the score, with only the notes marked.

2. Sponsors help me with vinyl pressing. It isn’t very expensive, but it depends on how many copies you press and how you design them. Pressing 300 copies with good packaging costs us about €3,000-3,500 on average. Prices differ from company to company, and where you press matters too, as do shipping costs and taxes.

3. You are absolutely right that my music stands closest to film music. Yes, that’s so, and it’s a sharp observation.

4. Excessive grandiosity? I would rather call it heightened pathos. I love pathos-filled works (and romantic ones too. I’ll soon upload my Adagio, which has not a trace of pathos and is entirely romantic and melancholic :) ). In general, I have works in many different genres, from rock and jazz rock to classical. I love working in different genres.

5. Now, the main point about this piece. Yes, when writing it I chose, for example, the structure of Tchaikovsky’s ballets. I still tried to carry one common motif (sometimes played by a flute, sometimes by another instrument) through the different parts, so as to keep a sense of unity. The outline of the piece is written above. It consists of 7 parts, and each part is meant to express the specific content of that outline. Take Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker or Swan Lake, where every part is an independent piece. I approached it on the same principle. Whether I missed something or it didn’t work out is another matter, and only the listener can decide that. For example, the fifth part is solely the attack of the sharks, and there I deliberately gave up the principle of a single, clearly pronounced leitmotif. So yes, that is a structural choice in my piece. Your view is close to mine. I also planned to make an animated film based on this piece, but so far no sponsor has appeared. As you know, film requires a huge amount of money. We’ll see. It’s a new piece, and someone may turn up.

And finally, thank you once again for the kind words. All the best.

The translation was done with Google, and I hope it says what I meant to say :)