A New Perspective a piece composed by Kenneth Connolly(Editor), Jake Greenburg(Scream/ideas), and Nick Artnotes(French Horn); Featuring: Paul McHugh(Guest Violinist)
This piece we composed was made entirely by us and our friends. I personally have a friend at Binghamton who is a state level violinist, record under my supervision and guidance. I made sure that he used dissonant chords and diatonic scales in order to create a feeling of discomfort in the beginning and made the music upbeat and hopeful towards the end. This piece is best listened to using headphones because I used an effect to make full discomfort for someone in the start. Nick, the member of our group, also contributed his own French horn playing into the mix, making up the middle time in which the life altering event happens.
We do not want to tell you exactly what this piece is, as to make you decide what the meaning is for yourself but we will let you know what the desired emotions and our thinking behind certain moments in the piece was,
In the beginning the listener is immediately presented with the overlay of violins with a slight delay. This creates a feeling of discomfort and uneasiness. This is where the dissonant chords are seen most prominently. There is also a background noise which mimics that of a heartbeat with growing intensity and tempo as the piece progresses.
The piece begins to climax when Nicks French horn begins to mask the violin in the background and take the listener deeper into the feeling of suspense. Finally Jake’s scream represents something major in this person’s life, it can be really anything but we tend to think of it is as a life endangering/ending event.
Finally, there is just the violin at the end, and if you listen carefully you will know whether the person in the song is alive/dead/afterlife. Once again we want you to come up with your own story based on the piece but that’s the artistic vision we took from this.
If you comment on this piece please tell us the story you heard from the piece.
Works Cited
Mussorgosky, Modest Petrovich. “The Hut on Fowl’s Legs.” Sonatas for Piano Solo. Dewagtere, Bernard. France: 2011. 17-27.
Shore, Howard “Concerning Hobbits” Lord of The Rings. 2003.London. London Philharmonic Orchestra, Nov 2004. Web.
Webber, Andrew Lloyd. “Phantom of the Opera” For Piano/Keyboard. Duet Piano Education. Hal Leonard, 2009. Web.
The one thing that really struck me about your piece was the last portion which seemed to strongly resemble a dirge. This led me to think that the fellow in your piece has passed away.
The story I got from this was movement from the chaos of everyday life into death as represented by the dirge at the end. The slow and ominous tone of the piece at the beginning brought me back to the ballet we saw of Metamorphosis. Gregor dreaded going to work everyday but as soon as he stepped into the daily grind it became a nonstop schedule of one chore after another. The music became a bit circus-like with the addition of the French Horn and this to me exemplified the hoops that we jump through each day as we go about our business-deadlines, new projects, running to catch the bus that always comes early etc. The scream seems to me come out of nowhere but I agree with you that it can be seen as an unexpected event that occurs. I’m thinking of a car crash since it flows with the probability of running to catch a bus and getting run over by a car in the process.
The beginning of this piece reminded me of a cliche’ horror story where there is something eerie and the main character decides to follow it. Then it shifted to like a song that would play in the past when a battle was over which I thought was cool because it was a storytelling and a sound sculpture at the same time. It would make for a great short battle scene and I think you encompassed all the important aspects of it.