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A short adventure theme in a minor ! [Youtube link added]

Discussion in 'Critique & Feedback' started by Antoine Fribond, Sep 27, 2021.

  1. #1 Antoine Fribond, Sep 27, 2021
    Last edited: Sep 28, 2021
    Hello !

    After following this forum for a few months, I've decided to post here a small composition written today : This is a first attempt at writing something above 10 seconds :D.



    At first, I drew the draft helped with keyboard, and then tried to orchestrate it.

    Thank you for your feedback !


    Sources :

    score, audio (flac) and draft (it takes a few seconds to load).

    (audio mp3 in case flac doesn't work)
     
    George Streicher likes this.
  2. #2 Marian Szewczyk, Oct 3, 2021
    Hey,

    congrats! ;) And if this is a "first attempt", it's really good. It's a nice theme and I do like the orchestration, sound-wise. So I'm saying, this piece has potential. I feel like the structure could use some help. It jumps into the theme right away, on full orchestration, without any buildup or introduction, and I sometimes felt a little "lost" during the piece, not sure where we are or where it's going. Maybe you can work on that and experiment a little. I know, although creating a good idea is hard enough, developing it is even harder, I always struggle with that working on longer pieces. Have you tried turning your draft into an actual full-length piano (or minimum-instruments) version before fully orchestrating it? That really helps me. I'd love to hear a revised version of this lovely piece soon, :) Keep up the good work.

    Cheers, Mar
     
  3. #3 Antoine Fribond, Oct 3, 2021
    Last edited: Oct 3, 2021
    Hello Marian,

    Thank you for taking time to listen and your encouragements ! I'm really eager to work on development and structure with longer compositions : based on this piece, or more probably on new ideas ! I didn't have a full-length version of this before orchestrating, only the draft I joined.

    This piece is so short that indeed I didn't really think of development or strong structure, apart from reusing material to give some cohesion (m.4 : melody uses some rhythm of main melody, mm.7-9 : transition uses a melodic cell of main melody, m.10 : main melody reappears with a different contour, m.13 : same as m.4 but in major, m.19-20 : it's the end of main melody, mm.21-23 : flutes use same melodic cell as m.7-9, mm.26-28 : same melody as m. 19-20 but in lydian and stretched).

    I'm interested to know the parts where you felt a little lost ? It will help me understand the lack of direction !

    Thanks
     
  4. #4 Marian Szewczyk, Oct 4, 2021
    I'll try to do my best, so here's my take on it: First off, I'm not actually sure what exactly the theme is. The start of the piece is actually fine, up until 0:05. The theme starts out strong, but I feel like it's never brought to an actual conclusion, or finishing a phrase (going back to the tonic, basically), but just keeps changing into new ideas, until 0:16, where it basically starts over. Maybe give it a little more work to round it up nicely. Also, after the first time through, you should definitely repeat it, to reinforce the theme. You'll have Mike say this all the time. Slightly altered, to keep it interesting, e.g. in the orchestration or harmony. Having done that, starting the theme again (0:16) but going in a totally different direction as it does there, would be a fresh change, and not so much of an unexpected surprise as it feels to me currently. Same thing goes for your "B section" basically. I would totally repeat 0:23-0:26 over one more time, to make it a thing of its own, before continuing in a different direction again. The ending, everything from 0:34 basically, actually sounds pretty nice. This is all just from the top of my head, but I believe it would make your piece a lot stronger. I'm curious to hear a new version of it, because the orchestration actually sounds really lovely. If you haven't watched Mike's masterclasses on structure and development, I can really recommend them. Helped me a lot. Also, the Unleashed classes are reaaally great for exactly this, and they're free.
     
    George Streicher likes this.
  5. #5 George Streicher, Oct 4, 2021
    I feel like all the ingredients are here. It's really a great tone and lovely orchestration! But I second what's already been said here. It needs structure and clarity of A & B melodies. This could so easily be expanded to a 2-3 minute piece. What you currently have feels like more or less where the piece would "end up" after stating your ideas more simply and clearly up top. But great work on this! Now go take all these top notch ingredients you've picked and make a satisfying full meal.
     
  6. #6 Antoine Fribond, Oct 4, 2021
    Last edited: Oct 4, 2021
    Thank you Marian and George for your detailed feedback, it is really helpful !

    Ok, so next time I will work on making the listener more accustomed to the material. Currently, it's a bit like a story full of ellipses or squeezed !
     
  7. #7 Marian Szewczyk, Oct 7, 2021
    What program do you use, Sibelius? Could you upload the score as MusicXML maybe?
     
  8. #8 Jay Polk, Oct 8, 2021
    Great work on this Antoine. Just keep developing your idea and this will be a really nice piece.
     
  9. #9 Antoine Fribond, Oct 15, 2021
    Thank you Jay !

    Marian, I use Dorico, here is the xml file of the project. However, when I import this xml to Dorico, there are several omissions (some pizz and harp gliss do not appear, and there may be other errors), so it may be worse in a different application thus you may want to double check with the original pdf score.
     
  10. #10 Marian Szewczyk, Oct 17, 2021
    Thank you Antoine. I noticed similar issues. But overall, it seemed to work surprisingly good actually. I've never tried it before, so I was curious to see the result. Seems like a legit way to transfer between different notation software. And let's you play around with it, other than a PDF score. Maybe I'll send you some piece over some time to hear how it sounds with NotePerformer ;)
     
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