Sometimes as an artist you create something that seems to stand apart from your other works. I’ll be the first to admit that some of the pieces I write are exercises in composing and musical experiments that don’t always succeed. Implicit to the concept of New Music Tuesday is the chance to workshop pieces and to see what catches attention. Some pieces seem to have their brief moment and then fade away, to the point that even I start to forget about them. Others, however, leave an impression.
Sometimes what starts as a musical exercise in form and restraint can lead to stunning results. Like poetry, restraint and structure and rules make the work better, not worse. Consider all of the free poetry you’ve heard or read. How much of it can you remember? But everyone remembers Robert Frost’s poems.
I’m not comparing today’s piece to the poetry of Robert Frost. I did, however, follow a (somewhat) strict set of internal rules when composing it. I never could wrap my head around formal counterpoint (although I was eighteen when I last tried, in an introductory music theory class at the University of South Carolina), but most of my chorales follow a set of self-imposed rules.
For example, the Oboe 1 part consists (until the sixth and seventh measures) of a whole note tied across the bar line to a half note, followed by a half note tied to a whole note. The Oboe 2 part follows the same pattern except in the first and seventh measures (each phrase is seven measures). Both parts must be stepwise in their motion.
I can’t remember off the top of my head what rules I imposed on the Bassoon 1 and 2 parts. They’re slightly different but follow a similar pattern. By forcing myself to stick (mostly) with these parameters, I ended up with some truly beautiful moments of dissonance and consonance. I especially love when the Bassoon 2 part—the final part to appear—enters in on the third time through the form. It enters on a haunting seventh interval interval, and it was fun bending it slowly towards a rich, four-part triad.
The piece starts with Oboe 1 and 2 playing through seven measures. Bassoon 1 joins on the second time through the seven-measure form; Bassoon 2 joins on the final section. Naturally, I had to add an “Amen” sequence.
With that, here is the double reed quartet chorale “Koi Chorale”:
Here’s the original manuscript, which just has the two oboe parts; note the mistake I made in the top line, which—because I wanted to stick to the rules—ended up changing the melodic line of the piece:
I may go back and try a different set of rules with that Oboe 1 part to see what I’d originally written sounds like.
Regardless, I am really pleased with how this piece comes out. My former neighbor, Across the Field Jerry, told me that it reminds him of the organ preludes at his old Lutheran Church. That made me happy—I love it when reeds, even digital ones, blend so well that they create an organ-like sound.
I added a “Cathedral” preset reverb effect and applied a mastering preset in Audacity to the track. The cool video effect is called “Vaporwave,” and is a preset effect in the YouTube Create app. The images were compiled in the iPhone version of iMovie, and come from our koi pond.
I had fun making the cover art (as always, in MS Paint Classic—ha!); I suppose I should have made it four fish:
The koi pictured is Cobbler, our blue koi. He is a big boy, and when it’s warm out, he loves to skim the surface of the pond looking for food. I thought his mouth looked like a fishy chorister:
What do you think of this little piece? Do you prefer writers, composers, etc., adhere to a set of rules and structure when creating, or do you appreciate less stringent creativity? Let me know!
Happy Listening!
—TPP
