Some pieces for a cappella choir

thanks for sharing thallo. I especially liked the first one, even if it doesn't seem very easy... the last one is interesting from 4' onwards, although perhaps it could be even more incisive.

Do you happen to have the sheet music?

How did I miss this topic? I hadn't really seen it... great question Bianca.

Bianca wrote:

Do you happen to have the scores?

not even one, unfortunately... if my choir uploads any videos or audio files, I would be happy to let you listen to "our" contemporary piece, the one that probably allowed us to pass the semi-final: a very interesting piece, written last year, by a Turkish composer (Yigit Ardin) titled "Friends of God". It combines a Sufi text and a poem by Goethe and is built mostly on the consonants of the two texts, used as reverb "during" the singing but also before. Very effective.

Regarding the previous videos, I will also say one more thing... it has been very complicated to find decent interpretations. All these scores, to a trained ear, have great potential. "Iupiter" is a well-constructed piece that calls to mind many other composers (Glass, Gorecki, Ligeti...). The video I uploaded of this piece is performed by the choir that won the competition, Leon de Oro. In my opinion, the performance in the video is comparable to the live one and is, in my humble opinion, PATHETIC. Until the effects kick in, it is all tremendously declining. And if you listen again with a critical ear, you will notice it too. This is the best demonstration I can give for a series of discussions made in the workshop about the choral piece :-) see, Bianca, the variables relating to performance are, in my opinion, too important. Okay, it's always the choir's fault, but non-tonal music, in my opinion, needs to be... helped, even by its own composers. Because not everyone understands it, not everyone is able to sing it well, to CONDUCT it well and, quite simply, to listen to it well. I don't mean that the way forward is simplification, far from it. I believe the way forward is understanding and explanation, as much as possible. Even of things that cannot be understood or explained.

thallo wrote:

Ok, it's always the choir's fault, but atonal music, in my opinion, needs to be... helped, even by its own composers. Because not everyone understands it, not everyone is able to sing it well, to CONDUCT it well and, quite simply, to listen to it well. I don't mean that the way forward is simplification, far from it. I believe the way forward is understanding and explanation, as much as possible. Even of things that cannot be understood or explained.

No, it's the Conductor's fault for not knowing when a piece cannot work or even worse... written poorly

the piece is not poorly written; at the competition, it was performed by another choir that did an excellent job. Poorly written pieces are recognizable, and I don't think that is the case here. I can agree on the issue of "it is too difficult." That is what I thought about Macmillan's piece, Christus Vincit. But even that one in the video is performed quite well. It is an undiscovered piece that requires soloists, not a choir, but it is possible to do it well. And when it is done well, it is stunning.

This is the difficulty of contemporary music. Some pieces are wonderful, only if performed impeccably

Aside from the fact that I wasn't referring to these specific pieces, but in general I can tell you (Thallo) that writing for a choir is different from writing for soloists... the same applies to the orchestra, the same applies to the band. A section is one thing, a soloist is another. Therefore, the composer must know this and cannot expect a choir of Pavarottis. If they do (paper is kind, anything can be done)... they might risk changing professions.

But staying more general (which was my initial idea, taking inspiration from one of your statements), I just wanted to say that the responsibility always lies with the conductor and never with the choir; if the piece requires a stellar choir... the conductor must know how to say no if they are not conducting it... I would always check the material first. That's all.

put in these terms, I can agree. But even an excellent choir can make mistakes in performances and I continue to think that ultimately the responsibility for the final result always lies on the shoulders of those who sing, not those who conduct. Ok, the choice of pieces is a complicated matter, but it too can be seen in different ways: there are those who choose only manageable pieces for their choir, so they can sing them in concert without problems, and there are those who take difficult pieces for didactic reasons, to teach their singers how to sing. There are moments when the risk is worth the reward and you don't care about giving a perfect performance, you just want to take a step further.

As a contemporary music enthusiast, I think that perhaps the most dissonant pieces are not ideal for teaching a choir how to sing, but in reality, most online interpretations of contemporary music (even if not for choirs) are made up of stratagems, small black holes, enigmatic moments, from performers who haven't fully understood what they are doing and have therefore decided to rely on a plot twist or an intellectualistic effect (it is so complicated that you cannot understand it, but its beauty lies in this incommunicability). If I were a choir conductor, I could decide to take a difficult piece and curate an interpretation "tailor-made" for my choir, that is, by highlighting the things I know how to do and what I don't know how to do. In reality, the world of contemporary music is so vast that one always finds an impressive piece that in the end isn't even that difficult to put together...

Anyway, I repeat, I quite agree with you with the idea that REPERTOIRE CHOICES are the responsibility of the conductor

Often, when I write music, I find myself dealing with this type of problem: the notation reflects what I have in mind only if performed "in a certain way," whereas if performed in a "standard" way, it risks being something else entirely from what I imagined. This mostly happens to me when I use "unconventional" harmonies or rhythms. Now, since I only use virtual instruments, this cannot simply be an issue of intonation, as these instruments are necessarily in tune. However, a harmonic progression, or a melodic passage, reflects a particular aesthetic idea only if played "in a certain way" (which obviously varies from case to case) and which probably becomes problematic in a real performance: for example, in a piano chord, it is not always easy to give different dynamics to the different notes, or a pianissimo on a trichord with the violin, or a ricochet on a bichord, etc.

The theoretical obstacle is therefore whether this type of writing makes sense or not, with all the consequences that an answer to this question entails.

In general, I think that performance today must face obstacles of a different nature compared to the past and that one should not give up on a certain type of aesthetic research just because it cannot be framed in a traditional sense, also because I believe that the main goal of a composer is not the instruments that perform, but the aesthetic content they pursue. If instruments become "constraints," then the wisest thing to do is to "update" the instruments, and to do this, the first step is certainly dialogue and interaction with the instrumentalists.

You are the one who has to say all this, though. I mean, it is you who must write on the score "either play it like this or it's better not to play it at all". And that is one of the ways of "helping" contemporary music.

In general regarding your point, however, I think you should consider the possibility that this isn't just a war :-) I mean, between saying "either this or nothing" and saying "everything is fine". There is a middle ground. I don't say this because I think you haven't understood it; I say it for the sake of completeness in the discussion: it is possible to overcome almost any performance problem nowadays, precisely because the means have adapted and continue to adapt. Vocal means are the most difficult to change, but also those that can potentially change better than others. A good composer should strive to find a way to communicate their aesthetic requirements, not just to formulate them. Or rather, formulating one's own aesthetic requirements in music does not mean just conceiving them in one's own mind and "ear"; it means finding a comprehensible way to turn them into performed music.

I agree that it is difficult. Contemporary music scores often have very long introductions precisely because the musical meanings within the music, the "gestures," are often so technical as to be incomprehensible to most. And so I must explain them by going beyond the music, talking about them, over-talking them, sometimes creating philosophical or aesthetic landscapes. The role of the composer does not end with thinking the music or making it played by computer programs. Unless that music is limited to musical software, but in that case the issue is quite different and moves away from this topic

Certainly, and moreover, at least as far as I am concerned, virtual instruments do not reflect an ideal performer at all (not to mention those for human voices); they are emulators and, as such, approximations (unless one is writing for synthesizers, but that is another matter).

Bianca wrote:

(unless you are writing for synthesizers, but that is another matter).

What am I reading... I hope it's not my "fault"

Frank wrote:

What am I reading... I hope it's not my "fault"

eheh