The glockenspiel & calliope, not something I would have
thought of to use as instruments for this touching piece, but
it seems to work OK. Schubert was definitely the songsmith,
and this is a great one (and I'm not saying that just because
my music is posted under "SchwanSongs", a play on this very
turn of phrase :-) By the way, thank you for taking time to
do a bit of explanation/education in your music descriptions,
I watch for your stuff partly for this fun background you
post.
ttfn,
Drakonis

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Thanx to all for your kind and generous words.

Drakonis, if you like my program notes, you might enjoy the huge collection of my essays --"Malservations"-- I have posted at
http://www.classicalarchives.com/articles/index.html

Most deal with why classical music has so few listeners and why the presentation of classical music today is so boring (gasp!), but I also take swipes at commercial pop music and the entertainment industry. They're
written in my most polished formal style (in hopes that I'd be offered a writing job), but but some are pretty funny (such as when I recall meeting the celebrated composer Philip Glass).

I confess that at times I was testing to see how far I could push in trying to offend the classical establishment ("Hang All The Conductors!"), and I received several indignant messages from classical musicians. But I believe that people enjoy reading abuse, and I wanted my writing to be entertaining.

Some essays call attention to living composers I admire -- guys who aren't just writing noise, but are creating fine music that you would enjoy.

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I enjoyed your Philip Glass story, since my mother and I both love his work but also tend to mock him a lot. In fact I started writing something in GB to try and take advantage of what's good about the JP4 strings (the tremolo, the staccato) and am now having to try VERY hard not to make it a Philip Glass "homage" (aka ripoff). When I played it for my mother she started singing the arpeggios right where they'd predictably come in if it were a Glass piece. So your story amused me a lot.

I have to say I'm pretty impressed that he seems to be branching out more as he gets older, rather than repeating himself. His score for Naqoyqatsi, while retaining his signature style, is also really beautifully melodic and in some places heartbreaking. I guess there's only so far you can go with the same old chord changes (the Ramones might disagree) but I'm impressed that he isn't just sitting on his minimalist laurels.

(Sorry to have hijacked this post.)

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with this thrilling melodic timey musical gem.

These is a real precious gem, Especially posting about the
composer adds such emotional flavor!


Thanks so much for sharing!

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I like the use of unexpected instruments very much, and you do a great job of bringing the different sounds in and out, both maintaining variety and creating unity without repetition.

However, I am sorry to say that there IS something mechanical about this piece (I wouldn't call it "stiff" though). The volume changes are not smooth -- meaning it's very clear where they jump up a notch -- and the repeated notes in some instruments have a definite synthesizer sound to them.

I certainly have no objections myself to music being made in this way -- I really like synthy versions of classical music and have done a couple of my own -- but I don't think I would play this for someone I was trying to convince that computerized music can sound like the real thing. I WOULD play it for someone, however, who wanted to hear a lovely and unusual version of this piece.

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You are right it is a beautiful piece of music. Your
production is good, although some of it has a carnival feel
to it, which may have been intentional, but I thought
lessened the somber mood.

Your playing is very good. Very moving.

Very good work.

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