Sonata in C

The beginning of a new Sonata in C. The .MUS is attached. What are your thoughts?

Wav:

Sonata in C

Hey Matt,

So the piece is sounding good so far, but I've got some comments to make before you continue too far.

First off, some more harmonic interest would go very nicely with it; more interesting chords would make this sound like a more serious work.

Also, your piano writing is a little questionable in certain sections. For example, measure three is absolutely painful to read and play - it's awkward and unnecessarily complicated right near the beginning. Ditto for measure 5, that thing is just plain nasty; the rhythm is off and I'm not really sure where you were going with it, or if you were going anywhere at all, since the rhythmic weirdness just stops there. The ornamentations give it a neat happy feel, just make sure not to over-use them.

That's about all for now, keep working on it and revising as you go to make sure you end up with a coherent product.

Keep it up! :P

Well Matt. I liked it. What you have so far at least. However some of the left hands harmonies make the melody sound more serious than it should. It should sound a little more bouncy i think, because of the way it's written. It's an extremely classical peice soo...

Well, the first bar sounded like it was kind of put in there without much of an idea where the peice was going. I think the peice sounds much better if you omit the first bar.

Oh, I disagree with the comment on the first bar.. I think it fits well, but thanks for the input.

I'm not quite sure I understand what you mean about the left hand harmonies.

Could you give an example please?

Ok Matt,

Though there isn't a heck of a lot to go off of, I'm going to let you know what I think so far. No holding back.

There's quite a few things that you need to rethink:

a) Just like Marius said, there is no real interesting harmonies anywhere in here. If you had told me it was in a classical style, I could've written down the exact harmonies you just used without you even having to show me. It's too cliche in that department.

b) I don't see any clear melodic material coming through. Sure, you have melodies... but they 1) aren't leading anywhere 2) they have no structure.

c) This sounds very random. I think that the reason it sounds random is because of B. There is no material to grab onto... a nice motive would help clear this up and give it more direction.

d) I also must agree with Marius on the effectiveness of the writing. Mm3 is not nice looking at all. And, in mm5, you didn't even write a complete measure.

e) Mm4 made it sound like you were going to take a breath and then bring in something else... but your treatment of it made it sound random as hell. You bring in more 16ths before we even get a chance to rest from mm3's crazy donkey rhythms.

f) In mm7 I see that you tried to bring back the first measure and toy with it - I think if you had a better motive it would be a lot easier, and nicer to listen to. I did, however, like mm7- mm10. Kudos on those.

I think you should do a lot of revising on the first 6 measures of this piece (which may or may not change what you do with 7-10), because it doesn't seem to have any structure... or coherent melodical line that one can cling to.

Revise, then post again. I'd be happy to re-critique it.

- Duff

I recommend some sort of converter from wav to mp3 so it doesn't take so long to load.

I use power mp3 converter, google it, free, as far as i know

There... it's all edited and revised. Take a look. The rhythms and the end have both been fixed.

Could you post a midi file? My Finale is 2006 r.6 and I don't want to go through dowloading notepad again...

The link to the .wav is

Sonata in C

Is that okay?

Okay.. here's what I'm probably going to do... after measure three's crazy rhythms, I'm probably going to pause a few beats then play it again, then continue from there as written. So when you listen to it, just review it as if there was a pause after the first crazy rhythm and a repeat. Although I also might change the first three bars a little bit so it won't repeat the exact same thing.. what are your thoughts on this? Should I remove the crazy rhythm in measure three and not repeat, but then when this motif appears later on, add the articulation?

Also the first note (D) in measure five should be an eighth note, didn't have time to clear that up.

You know, what you have so far actually sounds more like the beginning of a piano concerto than the first theme of a sonata. I think the reason for this has to do with what others have mentioned before: there are melodic fragments, for sure, but they are not the sort of solid, confident "melody" that one thinks of as being the main theme of a piece in this style.

Another part of why this is so may be the irregular phrase structure. Your first cadence-like figure is at the end of bar 3. Aside from being too early for a cadence in the first place (a cadence is sort of a "there, I've said it, now I'm going to say something elses" figure, except the problem is that you didn't give yourself enough time to say anything) cadences usually happen at the 4, 8, or other powers-of-2 bar markings.

The other reason it sounds like the beginning of a concerto is because of the many textural changes that occur -- sometimes even within a single bar. The textural changes sound like an orchestral reduction, and they don't give the actual musical material quite enough time to settle in.

Now of course none of this is inherently "bad" -- I just want you to be aware of the effects that what you have written have on a listener. This is certainly the beginning of something, but I don't think it's the beginning of a traditional piano sonata.

(Small comment -- Listen to bar 1 a few times. Try to listen to it with fresh ears. Does something about it sound 'off' to you? It does to me, and the reason is because on beat three you have the left and right hand come together in an octave E, and they both approach it in the same direction. The moment sounds hollow, and it sounds like your motion stops because of the (what are effectively) direct octaves in your first bar. I'd suggest some minor edits to this and all other bars like it.)

Matt,

Better, though, I'm still having trouble finding direction in this piece. To me, and I mean no offense by it, it's just too random. I'm still not getting a clear melodic motive to go by. I think that if you used mm1-4 as your main theme, it would give the piece more structure... but, right now the piece just seems like several ideas thrown together with not much thought. The problem is that you're not allowing the listener enough time to digest everything thats going on. Once again, not trying to down you here, or anything. I've attached a PDF of the score with some revisions I made. I didn't change any of your content (aside from mm8's first 4 notes), just arranged it a bit differently. Take a look at it, and see what you can draw from it.

edit: In response to Michael:

I don't think that a certain melody or piece is destined to be a concerto, a symphony, or a quartet... or, as in this case, a sonata. This could be anything Matt wants it to be. It doesn't sound like it has to be a Concerto, it doesn't sound like it has to be a Symphony, it doesn't sound like it has to be a Sonata. My suggestion is for him to leave it as a sonata - especially becuase there are errors even now in it's simplest form, and if he were to orchestrate this through an entire symphony orchestra, I doubt that we'd see fewer problems.

Thanks for the input... I got Finale back up and did what I said earlier about the pause after the articulation of measure three. I didn't change anything else though. I did solve a small rhythmic problem by changing one measure to 2/4 time (not that there was really a problem, I just wanted emphasis on the C in the last measure.

I updated both the .MUS file and the .wav so you can listen again to the Steinway.

Your first bar still works the ear quite hard, especially considering it's the very first thing that your listener will hear!

The reason for this is that the melody begins on an A, implying the first inversion of the relative minor. It "resolves" down to a G, but because a major sixth is not a dissonant interval (rather, an imperfect consonance), the resolution is less than satisfying. What's more, you follow this with a 4-3 suspension over the G. There's nothing wrong with that in and of itself, but because it comes directly after what goes on inside your first beat, it sounds unsettling.

The remaining material up to about bar 3 sounds like a completely different composer wrote it. There are of course still the issues with phrasing and cadencing, which I believe have already been touched on by others.

Okay I got it.. you can check it in about a minute or so, it will be posted.

Overall you have a very nice work started here. I agree with the first thread that it may be somewhat difficult in measures 3 and 5. If you wish to keep these measures I would reccomend making the piece harder as a whole. You need to stop and consider who you are writing this for....kid, teen, concert pianist........? Also instead of writing out your trill in the second to last measure I would reccomend writing it as a trill with a grace note lead to the next measure then doing a footnote and the bottom of the page indicating how you would prefer it to be notated. Hope this helps.

Musically,

T.J. Menzel

Thanks. I have no idea how to notate the trill.. can't find that in the manual. Can anyone help me with this in clear steps or something?

I've fixed it for you already in my edition, CA

Well the trill in my version is e-d-e-d, etc.

...I'm aware...

Your trill begins on D.

Most classical trills begin on the note above, so taking into consideration the style you are writing this piece in, one would play the trill starting on an E. Believe it or not, Matt, I actually know what I'm talking about...

Finale was confusing me, I'm sorry, it plays it starting on D. I want Finale to play it back as I notated in my version, so how can set up the trill and then notate at the bottom as someone else had just said?

Wait... why would it matter what Finale played back, as long as you and the performers knew how it was supposed to play back...? I hope you're not writing this solely for a digital performance.

But, the answer to your question is: Use an ossia measure, and notate out how the trill should be played.

I don't really plan on playing it myself or giving it to someone else to play, since there isn't anyone I know that would want to learn. Although if I get through writing the entire thing, I might learn it.