Awaken

@jim-4

I need to start with a confession, I can’t find the score for this. I always start by making a file using the date as the working title, it is only after I have played about with an idea for a while that a title may come. I like to discover the character of the idea, and that takes time. I have tried to rush this stage, but if I don’t understand the character of the idea, I just don't know how to develop it.

This can be a problem in two ways, Sometimes I may like an idea as in the case of Awaken, but can’t see how to develop it, so it may wait on my hard drive until I go back to it (or not). Obviously this is a recipe to forget ideas. In that case I take the viewpoint that maybe the idea was not as good as I thought. Did you Know that George Gershwin, lost in a hotel room a note book containing over 40 new ideas. On finding out this Gershwin Just shrugged his shoulders. He believed he would come up with enough new ideas to replace the lost ones in a very short time.

Also, as the file title is a bit cold I find it hard to associate the title I come up with and the file I started out with. Things can get a little lost. Luckly I put Awaken in a folder in which I regularly access and play, but what can I do with it without staring again. I am now trying when I save in progress bits, to incorporate both file and working name (you live and learn).

I came up with Awaken, and I thought there is a good opening, but what next? I have a theory that if you get stuck on something let it go. You will either go back to it later with an answer or it will be dumped. Although I can only do work on one thing at a time, I like to have other ideas bubbling around in the background.

John Harrison

@jim-4

Link to Score

John Harrison was a major clever clogs of the 18th Century. His claim to fame is to to build a clock that was both accurate enough and resilient enough to be both taken to sea and to be used to measure Longitude to a very high degree of accuracy. This was essential for safe navigation of the ‘Seven Seas’.

I do not know much more about him, other than what I read in Wikipedia, but what came to mind was an artisan working away in a workshop, probably at home, trying to improve his design until he could claim his prize.

The music would not be out of place in Pinocchio, where the puppet maker is toiling away in his workshop. I added the tick tock sound to give it a feel of a clockmakers, although surprising enough, I do not think that John Harrison was noted as one of these.

For once (don’t worry it won’t happen too often) I have used a simple 2 2 time. The melody is played by a Fantasia, which has a very light sound. To balance this I had to change the sound of the piano backing to an electric one.

Parallel fifths and octaves, have a bad press in Classical music (although they can be found in both Mozart and Beethoven’s music). This is because they can take some of the richness out of the melody, but on the other hand some times that is what you want. I have decided to look into this in my own music. Sometimes you want this to happen, but as with all things knowledge is power (they can be hard to find even in small scores). So I have decided to use a plug in for Musecore that detects parallel fifths and Octaves. Hopefully this will make the harmony more interesting. I also want to split out the melody and harmony before Orchestrating by using a SATB lay out. So I have a new plan.

1. write the melody on a Piano with cords
2. expand the harmony over a SATB choir, maybe change sound to Piano
3. Run the plug in as above and see what happens, (don’t have to fix them all)
4. It is the recommended by Teachers to have a piece laid out in SATB before Orchestration

Again the result is straight out of Musecore and I am happy with the result.

Catherine The Great

@jim-4

Link to Score

In my opinion Catherine The Great was to Russia what Queen Elizabeth the first was to England, a great Monarch who brought stability in troubled times. By todays standards you could easily accuse both of being blood thirsty, but those were the days. The Russian people were used to being ruled by force. Many of it’s people where serfs, which is really a form of slavery. I think that this goes a long way to explain why Russia is what it is today. It’s people have never been able to enjoy democracy.

For my part I envision her as a proud, strong Woman. Yes, she had to scheme and plot, but I also think she had a softer side that knew how to let her hair down and have some fun. She was born of royal blood in Germany, a country then made up of small states ruled by Princes, who were really electors for the title of Holy Roman Emperor. She was able to hold her end in a court where intrigue and plotting was part of the fabric, failure in this regard could lead to death. Underneath there had to be a lot going on, strong enough to wrestle the throne from her husband, She then went on to rule for many years.

I have tried to make the music sound courtly, I hope the melody sounds like it could have come from the late 1700’s, about the time of Mozart. To my ears it sounds like a courtly dance, arranged for a simple backing of Piano and Violin, (I think Pianos where about then, although very much under development). Underneath there is a lot more going on. I have tried to experiment with constant time changes, without making it sound too weird.

Again this version is straight out of Musecore. I am pleased with the result.