My Listening Log

Throughout my courses with OCA, I will keep an ongoing log of anything and everything that I hear that may be of interest.  I don't plan to write huge amount on each piece, but maybe just a few ideas and thoughts about new things I come across. 

Listening Log

Evelyn Glennie performs PRIM by Askell Masson on snare drum

Evelyn Glennie’s use of the snare drum is this piece really displays the instrument’s character.  It begins with the familiar military tones but using a range of techniques, she uses the instrument to build character and tension, almost creating rhythm using the silence between beats.   Throughout her process, she moves seamlessly into more tribal beats, heavily relying on dynamics and stick techniques to create this piece. 

Italian Folk Song - O Sole Mio

Eduardo Di Capua’s O Sole Mio (1898) demonstrates the use of the tambourine using short notes to hold the rhythm of the piece.  Although the tambourine plays a quiet role within the piece, it is essential for holding together the timing for the instruments around it. 

‪John Cage‪ - Third Construction (in Metal)

This piece shows a huge amount of technical skill and a wide range of percussion instruments.  To me, the pieces seems to move through a variety of styles and at various points, you can feel influencing from various cultures.

I find the use of the tambourine to be extremely interesting in this piece.  The versatility of the instrument gives it a unique ability to blend in a number of different settings and this piece seems to really take advantage of this character trait.  I also found the use of claves to be very interesting.  My previous experience of claves has been very limited, but the instrument’s character really came through in places. 

The metallic feel to the whole piece also gives an industrial feel with military influences blending throughout the piece, especially with the introduction of the horn. 

‪Steve Reich - Drumming

I found this piece of the most fascinating pieces of percussion I have heard.  This piece is defined into very clear parts, yet the same basic structure seems to apply.   Throughout the main body of the piece, it seems that the drumming patterns stay the same, and the instrument changes to suit the mood of the piece. 

The beginning of this piece has a very military feel to it.  It incorporates the slow introduction of a number of drums adding intricacy to the beat as the piece moves on.  The piece then moves through a variety of feelings, each time incorporating different instruments.  The dynamics of this piece do not seem to vary as much as in some of the other examples I have heard. 

Assignment 1: A composition for a group of untuned percussion

Reflections of ‘Wild Dance’

I found this an extremely challenging and interesting task, which really allowed me to experiment with character and range of the instruments and the use of a variety of time signatures.   Although elements of the plan I made in Project 4 have been altered slightly, the basic structure of the piece remains the same using an A, B, A, B, C structure. 

Below is Assignment 1 followed by my reflections of this piece:

                    

 

                     

 

                     

 

                                          

Section A & Section C– ‘Demon’s Clash’ and ‘Demon’s Battle’

As mentioned in the original plan, I used the introduction given as a starting block to extend the principal section of this piece.  Centred around the idea of the demons fighting for power and attention, I created a mirror image of bars 3-14, elongating the piece and continuing the feel of an unbalanced rhythm.

As section A is repeated later in the piece, it sees the introduction of each instruments rhythm, which they have demonstrated in their solo.  I believe that although the principal ideas have been repeated each time, the piece remains fresh and interesting each time section A is heard with the addition of each instrument. 

Section C is the natural progression that occurs as each instrument blends its own rhythm into the principal section (A) of the piece.   Although it reflects the original use of variable metre from section A, very little of the ideas from section A remain.  I have opted to keep the idea of mirroring rhythm and dynamics in some places, but I believe that the character of each instrument has blended together well to create an expressive and frantic finale. 

The last three bars of the piece reflect the demon’s fatigue before an unmarked death in the final bars.  The use of dynamics here was essential to give the feel of the final push before death. 

Section B – ‘Demon’s Solo’

Although section B is labelled as the subsidiary section of this piece, I believe it be the most important section for bringing together and exploring the character of each instrument.  Although simplistic in the way some instruments play a muted rhythm to accompany the soloist, it allows the principal section to constantly evolve each time it is repeated by incorporating the instruments rhythm, demonstrated in its solo in section B.

During these solo sections I have incorporated a number of idea and motifs to demonstrate the character of each instrument, whilst also reflecting the character of the demon.   During each solo, I have tried to use dynamics and rhythm, drawing inspiration from the use of each instrument throughout history. 

The tambourine plays the part of a small, sinister demon resembling a snake.  I drew inspiration for this from the tambourine’s use in Italian folk music, especially the frequent use of trills and short notes.  I have tried to use this to reflect the hiss of the snake and the notation of short notes gives us the sense of this demon’s more frantic and sinister side. 

The snare drum plays the part of a stern, strong and large creature.  I have tried to draw on the military background of the snare drum, incorporating the use of trills and short expressive beats, whilst contrasting it with the slightly more varying and impulse beats seen in a number of traditional pieces played on the tabor and fife. 

The cymbal plays the role of a small creature with a shrill, loud cry.  As the cymbal develops throughout the piece I have used only crotchets and semiquavers to develop a more simplistic rhythm, which does not overpower the other instruments.  I relied heavily on the use dynamics to ensure the cymbal’s loud character didn’t lose the sense of struggle and equality in battle. 

The bass drum played the largest and darkest character.  The bass drum’s use across a range of musical genres inspired me to use its deep tone to build a feeling of doom and darkness.  It was hard not to incorporate the instrument’s military background through the use of trills, but I also tried to shorten notes to explore the instrument’s range.  

Project 4: About Structure

Structure

My initial observations of the beginning to Wild Dance were the frantic nature of the piece.  The variable metre and use of dynamics give the piece a sense of imbalance which reflects its title, whilst the use of grace notes give the piece a clumsy feel not easily suited to dance. 

With these observations in mind I have decided to continue the piece using the same instruments in order to unpick the sense chaos in the first section and portray each instrument as a different ‘demon’.   Having researched these instruments and their character and use, I hope to use each instrument’s character to help form the different sections of the piece. 

My first thoughts on the structure of this piece are as follows:

Principal Section (A) Demons Clash	Subsidiary Section (Bi) Demons Solo	Principal Section (A) Demons Clash	Subsidiary Section (Bii) Demons Solo	Reprise of Principal Section and Closing  (C) Demons Clash
Variable Metre – using 5/8,3/8,4/8,6/8 25 bars ♩ = 156	Using 5/8 25 bars ♩ = 90	Variable Metre – using 5/8,3/8,4/8,6/8 25 bars ♩ = 156	Using 5/8 25 bars ♩ = 90	Variable Metre – using 5/8,3/8,4/8,6/8 25 bars ♩ = 156

Section A – ‘Demon’s Clash’

I have entitled this section ‘Demon’s Clash’, as the frenzy and frantic nature of the piece inspired thoughts of fighting and conflict.  Given my idea to continue the theme of demons, I have decided to base the principal section around the idea of each instrument striving to exert power and authority over the other characters. 

I plan to reflect and mirror bars 3-14 of the introduction provided for this assignment to lengthen the section in order to later explore each instrument’s character.  Therefore I plan for bars 4 – 28 to be an exact mirror of the first 14 bars.  

Later in the piece, following a solo section from each instrument, their rhythm will be adapted slightly each time section A is repeated to revealed the nature of each character. 

Section B – ‘Demon’s Solo’

Following the sense of conflict in section A, I plan to balance this piece by contrasting the principal section with a softer and more clearly defined rhythm.  I hope for this section to explore the nature of each of the instruments and reflect each ‘demon’ finding it’s own rhythm within the group. 

I plan for this section to include a solo played by all four instruments, split across two sections (Bi and Bii).  By doing this, I hope to allow each instrument to demonstrate its range, ability and character whilst the other instrument play a simplified rhythm as a back beat.  I have decided to revert to a more simplistic time signature (5/8) to give the piece a sense of relief from the chaos of section A.  In addition to this, I plan to slow the tempo of the piece to a Moderato tempo of around 90BPM. 

I plan for the rhythm that each instrument has ‘spoken’ during its solo to be incorporated in principal section  (A) succeeding.  I hope that this will enable the closing section (C) to be a crescendo of each instrument’s rhythm, portraying an epic battle.  However, I still plan to use a variable metre and heavy dynamics in section C.

Section C – ‘Demon’s Battle’

As a reprise of section A in its use of mirrored rhythms, I plan for ‘Demons Battle’ to reflect a final mighty battle between the demons, resulting in the death of all characters. 

By this point, each instrument will have had the opportunity to demonstrate its own rhythm, which will be incorporated into this section.  I hope that this, mixed with the use of variable metre will create a loud and dramatic crescendo.   In the final bars of this piece I plan to use dynamics to portray the last burst of energy before the battle is over.  

Research Point: Variable Metre

Variable Metre

Boris Blacher was a 20^th Century composer, born in China in 1903 and is today regarded as one of the most influential musical figures of his time.  After finishing school he moved to Germany and studied composition with Friedrich Ernst Koch before becoming a well-respected teacher of music.   His career was interrupted by the National Socialist Party and he was forced to leave teaching after his music was deemed ‘degenerate’ by the Nazi party.  Blacher believed that there was a mathematical link to composing music.  Throughout his career he conducted many experiments exploring the mathematical nature of rhythm, but most famous was probably his study of variable metre seen in his Piano Concerto No.2 (1952).    

Blacher’s experiments with ‘variable metre’ were inspired by Arnold Schoenberg (1874-1951), an Austrian composer credited with devising the twelve-tone composition technique (‘note-rows’).  This technique involved ensuring that all 12 notes of the chromatic scale appeared in a non-repetitive way, but an equal number of times, within a piece.  Schoenberg’s ideas lead Blacher to begin studying the possibility of shifting the attention from harmony to rhythm, incorporating Schoenberg’s mathematical theory of  ‘note rows’ into his own composition.  Along with these ‘note-row’s’, Blacher devised a system of contracting and expanding measures within a piece using a variety of changing time signatures to completely alter the mood and structure of the piece.