Here is my new orchestral symphonic composition

Here is my orchestral composition in C min. I started it as kind of a soundtrack, with piano, solo viola (not cello) accompanied by solo violin spicatto. Then I deciede to develop a theme and switched to full orchestra, strings and woodwinds (flutes, clarinets, oboes and bassons), but no brass. I added only horns later in the composition. The middle part is full of modulations. I decided not ot return to piano and solo viola at the end, but may be I should repeat just a piano part.

2 Likes

I very much enjoyed this, youve improved since the last upload i listened to. i think its very nice. lots of movement and it feels full and quite well mixed. perhaps if there was anything that i would say you could improve on for next time it would be that you might want to use less reverb : but thats just me being picky. also, dont be afraid of using silence in parts. there were some parts of this that were crying out for a little bit of silence, like the break between the minor and major section. love it!!

Hi, Julia- I enjoyed this. Particularly around 4:17 where the strings come in rich and lush, but especially the staccato flutes! I’m not sure - it seemed like the harp had a little much on the reverb end. But boy, that staccato flute section overtop the strings, that I loved! Thank you for sharing and keep up the good work!

1 Like

thank you Geoffry! I will check out the reverb. I don’t know why there is much of it… I add just a tad… may be the samples already have it?? as for the break i know what you mean, but once i was criticized for a break like a guy said the orchestra stopped playing completely and that was not possible… so I think I need to think about a transition between parts like a long note/s played by one instrument which introduces a new part… like in a symphony… because if we take a usual electronic composition there are real breaks between the parts like there is no sound at all… do you mean these kind of breaks? Or just transitions?

1 Like

Thank you, Troy! I think the stac works really well - I am getting better at orchestration now… read lots of books… I will check out the reverb… may be the samples already have it… usually I don’t add much

1 Like

yeah perhaps its how you are putting the reverb on. to my ers it sounded like you used the full spectrum of everb available. if your reverb has a built in filter or Eq then filter the lows out as high as 500/700 and filter the highs out down to around 2000/3500hz. then youll have the effect of putting your instruments in the same space without muddening up your mix. id suggest doing this with an aux send to save CPU. that way if you dont have an eq on your reverb then you can add an eq plugin afterward and EQ it out just the same.

regarding silence in pieces. its good to add this as it is another way of creating suspence. listen to the surprise symphony by Hydn. theres aa lot of silence in that piece and the introduction of loud elements afterwards really sets off the mood. in terms of your piece there were a few moments it was getting quieter and i was waiting for the time when it actually would, which was great, but it never got there. slowly dying down like it did gave you the opportunity to do that effectively and create the suspense the new major section needed. in an orchestral piece we can still have silence, there is no need in any piece to keep all instruments playing all of the time. samples are different yes, we can include silence more easily but with orchestral workes we can find ourselves getting caught in the “i have to have instruments playing all the way through” trap. think about it in this sense, film music isnt about the orchestra playing all of the time. its only introduced when it is needed in supporting the narrative. in this case the narrative is your own making. your telling a story with sound, so imagine when you need music and when you dont. think of the breaks in your music as breaths. they are momentsfor you and the listener to revaluate the direction.

be careful who you listen to for criticism of your pieces. if someone says things like that without giving constructive advice thats connected with the critique, then id assume they are just there to put your piece down.

take care, and i really did love the piece :slight_smile:

thanks! I will revisit the work and see what I can do to improve it

1 Like

There is nothing I can add that would make this composition better. I really like the, for me unexpected, chord changes in the middle. Beautiful music. Bravo.

1 Like

Thank you, Frederik! I already improved it a bit adding a break before the middle part and improving reverb. The middle part is in F maj, which is Dorian mode if we take C min as the main key. The middle part is full of modulations, which I like too, because it adds this interesting character to the whole composition.