Sanctuary for Soprano Saxophone and Piano

Hi all, apologies for not having a recording of this piece, one does exist but it was recorded on a very cheap mp3 player and literally sounds like one of those old recordings of yesteryear (quite nice in some ways lol)

I was asked to write this piece for my flatmates final end of year recital last year. She asked for something that was expressive and lyrical of about 5 minute duration. I think I fulfilled the brief very well and am really pleased with the piece. The first performance was very well received and it will be played again in march with myself at the piano for the first time.

Just wanted to see what people thought of it. Obviously, a piece like this is going to sound pretty nasty on midi but its the best I can give at this stage until a recording is made of the next performance.

So bear that in mind and imagine the human touch and the beautiful tone of the sop.

Thanks

Sanctuary.sib

Sanctuary.mid

By the way, the faster middle section plays too slow in the midi, it should be slightly quicker and more animated and because there is no metrenome after the cadenza, just an a tempo marking, it plays the ending too quick! God bless midi, so apologies once again, maybe its best just to look at the score instead.

This is a very nice piece, albeit a little motley. One thing that I thought a little weird was the use of a major sixth at the end of a phrase; I don't know why, but that just caught my ears as a little weird. Also, for mm 37-48, I really didn't like what the saxophone was doing, it just didn't grab at my interest.

Again, this is a very nice piece, good work on it. I'm sure your friend was very pleased.

Hey, thanks for your reply. I'm not sure what you mean by motley, sorry? The measures you talk about do sound quite bad on midi but its actually quite a passionate and intense part of the piece, with the sax playing this descending scale, but with a sense of drama and passion in the tone. Particulalr yin my own performance of the work, an not noted in this version of the score, this whole section should gradually build and swell to give the impression of a a rising emotional outburst. Of course, I appreciate if its not to your taste, but it seems to work better in the flesh.

As for the major sixth, could you give some examples of where abouts you mean? I'm not sure why it seems unusual to you?

Cheers

Forget what I said about the sixth, actually; listening to it again, it does sound quite natural. Anyways, what I mean by motley is that the piece seems to jump around a lot; which is by no means a bad thing. It seems to flow within the context of the piece, which is nice. Like I said, this is a very nice piece, and I'm sure it sounds wonderful in person. I would enjoy to hear a live recording of this.

I really enjoyed this piece; it was really beautiful. The faster middle section my favourite. I'd love to hear it live! :P No other comments.