And now for something completely different!
For this next tune contest, I'd like you to write some chamber music (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chamber_music). This term covers a wide range different types of music, but some typical examples include string quartets (two violins, viola and cello), piano trios (violin, cello and piano), wind quintets (usually flute, oboe, clarinet, bassoon, and French horn), and brass quintets (usually two trumpets, horn, trombone and tuba). Think about what you might hear at a wedding, or a high-class restaurant, and you'll get the idea.
Some good examples may be found on the Wikipedia page linked above. Some less typical examples are Ligeti's Chamber Concerto (for thirteen instruments), Stravinsky's L'histoire du Soldat (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Histoire_du_soldat) (for seven instruments, three voices, and optional dancer), and Paul Schoenfield (http://www.paulschoenfield.com/)'s Cafe Music, which is scored for an ordinary piano trio but is heavily jazz-influenced.
For the purposes of this tune contest, I'll with the following rules.
- Your piece must be at least one minute long.
- You must limit your genre to classical, light classical, or jazz.
- You may use up to five single acoustic instruments. For example, acoustic guitar, violin, trumpet, bagpipes or ocarina are fine. But string ensemble is not, because it's a whole section of players; electric guitar is not, because it is not acoustic; and synth brass is not because it is electronic and is not a definite instrument.
- You may use the same instrument more than once (e.g. two French horns), but the total number of single players must not be more than five.
- Percussion, as playable by a single player, is permissible -- either orchestral percussion or a drum set. However, the music should not have a repeating drum beat in the background.
- MIDI, samples, or live recordings are all fine.
- Your entry must be posted in this thread by Monday, May 10, 12am Alaska time (GMT-0900).
I realize that some chamber music does not fit this mold -- e.g. Paul Schoenfield's High-Rock Ballet, or Steve Reich's Electric Counterpoint. However, I hope that these rules will still give enough creative latitude for folks to write something, but stretch them a little bit so that they create something a little different than they normally would.
Have fun!
Phew...
That's quite a hard one.
Good chamber music is really difficult to make since you have to know the instruments exactly.
Do you mean with "classical" all music that fits on what people call classical music,
or do you mean the epoch?
In that case my question would be: Is neoclassical allowed?
(You mentioned L'histoire du soldat which can be considered neoclassical...)
Yes, writing good chamber music is tough -- I don't expect any masterpieces here, just something a little different from the normal fare. I did allocate two weeks instead of one this time, though. ;)
I meant any music that people would consider classical, from pre-renaissance to 21st century, not just the classical epoch. Good question! :)
"Nautica"
a Trio for Clarinet, Piano, Cello
The link:
http://www.startrekadventures.com/yearone/Nautica.mp3
Alt. Link:
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=FZ03JOET
I think something that should be added to the rules from now on is that the piece must be new. Those of us who are relatively new at composing get stuck with the time limit while those who have been composing for much longer can rehash stuff that they've worked on for much longer.
I can't even enter the contest because of other obligations, but I'm just sayin'.
Just a reminder that there are less than two days left in this contest! I'd love to see some more entries. :)
Can I have more than 1 entry, please? := If not choose whichever you want!
Int. Music I for string quartet (http://www.nikolas-sideris.com/stuff/intmusic.mp3)
and, at very very low quality, in purpose: Unique, for piano, trumpet and electronics (http://www.nikolas-sideris.com/stuff/unique.mp3)
The reason that Unique is on a mono, low quality, mp3 is because the original copy exists solely at the hands of a dear friend of mine.
I don't care about winning, but at least this is a chance to show case a few things which I think I've not shared with you guys!
Kabukibear: You are right! :-[ I've done these for a long time now and worked very hard to make them happen. And I can't say I find it fair. But either way, I really don't care about winning... Really...
Enjoy...
Since Viking has not yet appeared, can I still submit something through the course of the day? I have to go to school now, but I've got a smashing idea and I can work it when I'm back. It is now 5:53 AM London Time so I'll be back around 1:30 PM London time, so my submission will come in an hour-two after that?
I'm sorry if I'm messing up any schedules, if it's not possible then alrighties, but if it is, then yay! :D
Scratch that :( (due to unforseen circumstances)
ShiverMeSideways,
Sure, I'm always happy to have more entries! But I do want to wrap this up by Wednesday evening (about midnight GMT).
VA-VOOM! Ninja song!
Harmony to Disorder (http://www.mediafire.com/?d5wom2bylc2).
(Fake) Instruments used:
* Acoustic Guitar
* Piano
* Violin
* Cello
* Contrabass
Time signature: 4/4.
Scale: A Minor.
It's not classical or very jazzy, I know, but it fits into 2/3 of your rules :D
Wow, four very different entries! Hooray! Regarding the question about multiple entries, what I'd typically do is to take the entry that (in my opinion) was the best and use that.
Let's see, here are my rather uneducated comments about each entry:
DrewCCU:
+ Lyrical, melodic, pleasant to listen to
+ Quite playable
- Harmony changed almost exactly on the downbeat of every bar
- Continuously parallel motion in the harmony -- not that this is necessarily a bad thing, but I felt it wasn't appropriate in this case
Nikolas:
Int. Music I:
+ Fantastic technique -- sul ponticello, idiomatic double stops, false harmonics, etc.
+ You "landed" on some truly wonderful chords
+ Nice paratonality -- rather reminded me of Berg
- Seemed awfully discontinuous, which (for me) didn't hold the listener's attention very well
- Seemed a bit directionless in places
Unique:
+ Wonderful jazz-influenced style
+ Very adventurous trumpet writing -- I got fussed at when I wrote something that went up to a concert Db :P
+ Somewhat "popular" style and familiar form (ABAC-ish) helped to keep the listener's focus (or mine at least)
- I felt the piece would have been just as effective with a tuba instead of the electronics; I couldn't tell from the recording whether you modulated the trumpet electronically, but that could probably be simulated with mutes and/or moving the player around the hall
ShiverMeSideways:
+ Interesting, effective combination of instruments, although you probably could have done without either the cello or bass
+ Nice style, unusual for chamber music
- Guitar part would probably be impractical on an acoustic guitar, especially with the slides that were held for a considerable duration after the slide ended; sounded more like an electric guitar part
So here are the rankings:
Gold: Nikolas (I'll choose Int. Music I because it's fully acoustic, hence following the rules, but I actually preferred Unique)
Silver: ShiverMeSideways (not exactly classical or jazz, but that's OK ;) )
Bronze: DrewCCU
Thanks to all for entering!
Yay, silver! Thank you very much for the kind words! And good job by Nikolas and DrewCCU as well! :)
Quote- Guitar part would probably be impractical on an acoustic guitar, especially with the slides that were held for a considerable duration after the slide ended; sounded more like an electric guitar part
The guitar part I composed with my acoustic in hand and I can play all the parts. Of course it sounds a bit off in MIDI format as opposed to what a proper instrument sounds like, maybe that's why it feels not quite right. To be honest, the bends and slides work much better on the real thing and sounds more powerful as well, so I wouldn't say that the duration of those elements was the problem. Also, it might not sound very acoustic-y because I am an electric guitarist at heart so that's why the solos might sound a bit too electric-y. Everyone I've given the song to has a different opinion, and everyone is entitled to his own, of course, so please don't take any offense or anything, I'm just discussing here :).
Quote(not exactly classical or jazz, but that's OK ;) )
Well, I'm not very familiar with neither genre. I don't know how they work at the moment, so I didn't try to force myself into those types of music. However, I really love composing music that I don't do very often, (I usually do over-the-top heavy metal) so the chamber music with only a max of five acoustic instruments was very fun for me to do.
Cheers and well done to everyone! :D
EDIT: Since I'm such a crazy poo-head, I forgot to do something very important. A major THANK YOU to Viking for letting me participate, despite my arriving-late-and-then-bailing-and-then-coming-back-again condition. Sorry to be such a bother...
YAY! I won! ;D
viking: Here are my replies to your well thought out comments.
Int. Music I. The Int. in the title stands for Interactive. In theory, with every playback you would receive a different piece performed, plus an easy enough GUI to guide the music towards... something. The project was never completed, but a new one was born out of it, which sadly I can't get into due to patent pending issues...
It's a live recording (as it's apparent), but because of the interactive elements, not used in the pure recording it is indeed directionless and rather vague. That said I really liked that kind of vaugness so I kept it as is...
Unique. This piece was a present to a dear friend of mine. He, and only he (not even me) holds the high quality recording, of 5:1, 24-bit 96 Khz (in a DVD) format. The one that you, and I, hold is a lame mono mp3 at 96 -bitrate or lower (can't remember right now). Believe me the 'magic' of electronics in the DVD is simply stunning (along with the right equipment to listen to it, of course).
It is made with samples, and not live and it actually CANNOT be performed live, exactly because of various tiny details (the trumpet part, for example, which is on purpose) and the electronics. The uniqueness of the 'artifact' can be found in the recording (and the score). Had it been a piece for a live performance, the uniqueness would've been completely gone.
So there are the reasons that you very well got out of the two pieces.
Thanks for your vote!
I should start, at some point, the new competition... :)
@ShiverMeSideways:
Aha. The fact that you own and can play an acoustic guitar makes you more of a guitar expert than I, so I retract my comment. ;) I've heard a number of acoustic guitar works (popular and classical), and I've messed around a little with friends' guitars, so that was the immense amount of expertise on which I was basing my opinions. := By the way, I do play the violin, and nothing about your violin part seemed unplayable or particularly awkward, so congratulations to you there.
[begin pompous inaccurate lecture]
The differences between popular music, jazz and classical music are many and varied, too complicated to get into in any detail here. Typically the harmony, voicing and form (structure) of classical music is precisely specified rather than being partially improvised at performance time, and a great deal of care goes into selecting the exact instruments and harmony to achieve the acoustic effect that the composer wants to achieve. (Of course, Nikolas' Int. Music I is a counterexample with respect to form.) On the other hand, the staging, stage presence/charisma, overall chordal structure, melodies and "beat" of popular music tend to be the most important factors. Jazz is somewhere between the two. It usually has a lot of syncopation, seventh chords, and improvisation, and tends to use brass instruments, piano, string bass, guitars and drumset. But the staging is less important and the instrumentation more important than typical popular music.
Both in the past and in the present, popular and classical styles have often borrowed from each other. For example, Sting used part of Prokofiev's Lieutenant Kije Suite in one of his works; and John Tesh used Delibes' Flower Duet in one of his works. On the flip side, Eric Whitacre has composed an opera called Paradise Lost that is heavily influenced by electronic/trance music and anime. Paul Schoenfield often uses "serious" classical, "light" classical, jazz and popular styles all meshed together in his works. And in fact, Nikolas' Unique meshes both "serious" classical and jazz styles.
[end pompous inaccurate lecture]
@Nikolas:
Int. Music I: That sounds like a really neat idea -- aleatoric music for the 21st century! But only if the GUI is implemented in AGS, of course. ;)
Unique: Cool! The mono MP3 with a low bit rate, and the fact that I'm listening on nothing but the highest-quality 6-year-old $50 stereo speaker/subwoofer set, would then probably be why I couldn't discern the electronic influence except for the obvious long bass notes. ;) I'm amazed that you used samples, I absolutely could not tell.
Oh -- and by the way, it's great to hear live recordings obviously played by very good players! I was just informed that my sister and two of her friends, who are seniors at a well-known conservatory, just "read" a divertimento I wrote for violin, clarinet and trombone. I can't wait to hear it! (They have recorded it but have not yet emailed it to me.)
QuoteOh -- and by the way, it's great to hear live recordings obviously played by very good players! I was just informed that my sister and two of her friends, who are seniors at a well-known conservatory, just "read" a divertimento I wrote for violin, clarinet and trombone. I can't wait to hear it! (They have recorded it but have not yet emailed it to me.)
That is just wicked, man! :D Hearing your music being played by other people is probably one of the greatest feelings a composer can have, so I'm happy for you! :)