We’re getting into the cozy part of the Christmas season, with plenty of cold nights spent bundled up by the light of the Christmas tree, sipping hot chocolate and wearing sweaters. It’s the hygge, and yours portly couldn’t be happier.
Naturally, all this cozy Christmas cheer gets me thinking about Christmas carols, and few carols capture the quiet peace of Christmas quite like “Silent Night.”
Okay, I’ll admit—this week’s Open Mic Adventure is a bit of filler. Even the best albums have some filler, right?
I really have been trying to up the content game a bit lately, but in an effort to work ahead on the blog a bit, I’m digging deep into some compositions that are really more exercises for me than intended for general consumption.
Still, I thought this piece would give a bit of an insight into how I go about composing, specifically when I write chorales. I like to try to challenge myself to link together a single note across multiple measures in one or two of the voices, morphing the other voices around those pedal tones. The challenge comes in trying to find chords that fit these pedal points.
“Listless Chorale” is one such attempt. I’ll confess, I’m not totally pleased with the outcome—thus the “listless” in the title, as it feels like it’s not really moving anywhere—but you might find some beauty in its harmonies.
Amid last week’s chaos I managed to squeeze in a little composing one night. I was messing around with yet another waltz in my music journal, which I then edited quite a bit once I got into Noteflight and started putting in the notes.
I did not start out with German potato salad (the meaning of “Kartofelsalat”) as what I hoped to portray musically. I was just scribbling around, and when it came time to assign my little piece a title, “Kartofelsalat” popped into my head. It perhaps makes sense: it sounds funny, it’s vaguely German (this waltz has a bit of a German flare to it), and it’s a mix of various musical ingredients, much like the delicious side dish.
Over Thanksgiving Break, I renewed my subscription to Noteflight Premium and began fooling around with the software again. My niece and nephews found it fascinating, and starting writing their own little compositions.
They asked me to write something, and I started with a simple theme in 3/4, which would become “Firefly Dance.” After they left to go back to their home, I buckled down and expanded the theme into the piece I’m featuring today.
In order to have a working YouTube version available, I scheduled the video to go live this morning (Tuesday, 28 November 2023).
I haven’t been able to compose quite as much lately as I’d like, but I had fun with a little 5/4 composition that I wrote on 8 November 2023. It’s called “Orange Roll,” mainly because I wrote it with an orange gel pen, and I had fun playing around with the harmonies and variations on it.
I’m dipping back into the hymnal for this week’s Open Mic Adventure, from the same Sunday service as last week’s installment. This week, I’m featuring a short video of the hymn “‘Tis So Sweet To Trust in Jesus,” written by Louisa M. R. Stead and set to the tune “Trust in Jesus” by William J. Kirkpatrick.
In the wake of Anklegate 2023, I’ve been leaning on the Lord (and other people) more than ever. So it seemed appropriate to look back a piano performance of the hymn “I Need Thee Every Hour” from before the Sunday, 22 October 2023 morning service at my church.
I’m diving back into Péchés d’âge moyen with the track “Andante in D major“; it’s a sweet little lo-fi tune that I enjoy, with some vaguely Impressionistic shades.
Now that school is back in session, yours portly isn’t making it out to open mic night much, so I’m doing what I do best: mining the rich veins of my old, neglected works.
This week I’d like to share “Minuet for a New Moon,” which I composed on 9 February 2022 as part of Péchés d’âge moyen, the highly unpopular collection of lo-fi solo piano pieces I released largely as part of an inside Internet joke.
My latest album, Spooky Season II: Rise of the Cryptids has now hit all streaming services. That includes the following:
…and many more. That being the case, I thought I’d look back at two recent Open Mic Adventures posts:
Happy Sunday!
—TPP
Other Lazy Sunday Installments:
