1st Orchestra Discovery Session - Composition Diary - Adrian Gucze

Today, we have a look at Adrian Gucze's piece VENTUS that he wrote for our first Orchestra Discovery Session back in September. Attached to this post at the bottom you can download the different versions of this piece and which stages it went through.

Here's Adrian's documentation:

Hi everyone and thanks for taking the time to read this.

This piece started off with the concept of staying very straightforward both rhythmically and harmonically to both make the idea more accessible but also because at the time this piece was written I had just finished an orchestra recording where my own piece was getting above my head within the session which I wanted to avoid for this particular piece.

I will link the final piece and will reference the very first demo of this piece throughout which will make obvious what changes the piece went through following Robins feedback.

Recorded version:
https://soundcloud.com/orchestra-discovery/adrian-gucze-ventus?in=orchestra-discovery/sets/woodwind-quintet

The piece starts off with a couple bars of crescendos as I liked the idea of swelling into the chords with the woodwinds. Initially this section was just simply playing mf throughout in the very first version Especially those first 16 bars serve to accommodate the listener into both the rhythmical and harmonic things happening.

The very first demo I sent to Robin shows very quickly how much this piece has changed:

https://soundcloud.com/orchestra-discovery/adrian-gucze-ventus-1st-draft/s-gAnhFgbyq6t

First of you’ll hear that in the initial demo the instruments were making only very little use of their dynamic range which was amongst the first lines of feedback from Robin.

In the final version you hear how the instruments have much more of a crescendo/swelling motion in them in the intro.

In the following bars the initial idea was to have the instruments kind of wander off to each do their own thing. In the original version I was making a couple of mistakes here like having the individual lines cross multiple times (which you can also still hear in the demo) which made it confusing and hard to follow the respective instruments. But what you’ll also hear is much different from the final version is that the first demo was much more stiff and didn’t create much contrast in both the orchestration but also compositionally the rhythmic element didn’t change very much and it became boring very quickly.

If you take a look at this excerpt from the final recording and compare it to the linked demo you’ll notice the syncopations in the flute and clarinet to give it rhythmic texture while also changing orchestration-wise who was doing the lead melody line and who was doing the harmonic backdrop.

This section also includes what was maybe the most important thing I took away from this session, which was having to keep up interest both rhythmically and with such small ensembles texturally (which I neglected a lot up until then). It doesn’t even have to be radical big changes but just changing the leading instrument from flute to oboe as heard from bar 16 onwards to help change the color of the piece.

Even though it is a small ensemble I took the chance to develop the idea of leading this track into a kind of ‘climax’ which is happening in bar 65 with a tiny intro by the clarinet the bar before.

This part changed throughout the feedback too, you can hear that the groundwork for this was already laid way back in the first demo if you compare them.

I wanted to make this the harmonically most interesting and both ‘catchy’ part and give it a kind of pop-song ‘chorus’ vibe so I tried to dial back the rhythmic side of the piece which was way more in focus up until now.

At the end of the chorus we go full circle trying to bring back the chord crescendos as an outro so the track gets a coherent feel and the listener (hopefully) remembers that we’ve been hearing a version of this before. I’m still keeping a couple of rhythmical and harmonic movements from the ‘chorus’ to make this more interesting instead of a simple replica of the intro which you can hear past bar 86.

As this is intended for both documentation but also for the other Patreon followers:

I hope even though this piece is very simple you were able to get something out of it ! Personally, I’m the kind of guy who needs concepts explained with colored crayons (and apples + oranges) as I’m not musically trained in any way and know from experience that there are a lot of people out there who prefer concepts explained on more straightforward examples as well as they are more easily and more broadly accessible.

And even a simple piece like this gave me a lot of obstacles to work on and (most importantly) made more clear for me on what parts of my compositional skills I have to work on. Nevertheless if you have any questions feel free to contact me personally or ask questions in the comments, I was able to pull a lot from this community and I’d love to give some of that back if there is a need for it.

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I also had some exchange with him where we also had some talks about notation:

My feedback after Version 1:

Hi Adrian,

thanks for sending your piece over. I had a look at it and while there are some nice moments in it I feel it needs a bit of work.

I think the essential thing to understand with a woodwind quintet is that you are relatively limited with the textural colors so consequentially you need to find ways to keep up musical interest through other parameters. The biggest issue I have with your piece at the current state is that I feel it dramaturgically plateaus all the way through which, if I may speak frankly, makes the piece a bit boring in my opinion.

For instance, you keep the entire piece in a nondescript mezzopiano/mezzoforte area. Why not create interest through dynamics? Maybe even contrasts, I feel you are completely neglecting these possibilities. But also, considering the "orchestration", I feel it is too much of the same for too long. The flute leads most of the time with oboe/clarinet doing middle line work. I like that you sometimes drop out individual instruments to create a bit of variety but I feel that you can be more adventurous with this.

Another issue is the lack of rhythmic dramaturgy. Just looking through the piece, I can really not find any sign of dramaturgic raise or fall, it's all more or less a relatively relaxed quarter note pulse that is underlaying, lots of downbeats but nothing where I have the feeling that it is developing somewhere or reaching a climax. Don't get me wrong, this piece feels relatively relaxed and calm so I don't expect a ff climax with 32 note movements, but a sense of a larger structure that gets communicated more clearly through the musical devices would really benefit the piece. Maybe try leaving more downbeats free in the accompaniment. I could imagine 8th note based accompanying structures that start on "1 and" to break out of the static rhythmical model. How about breaking the predictable pattern by maybe inserting a "not 3/4" bar at strategic points? How about creating forte/piano contrasts between neighboring bars where appropriate? You have these answering phrases (eg 4/5 answers to 2/3) which you could later on contrast dynamically by making one forte and one piano?

I also could see more variety in the playing style. There are a few staccato notes in your piece right now but they feel more like accidents

Besides, I like the simplicity of the idea but we have excellent players available that you can challenge technically a bit more, especially as you want to explore the possibilities of the instruments with this piece.

So I would encourage you to dare more with this piece. Make these parts exciting and interesting to play. Looking at some of the middle parts right now, I would feel kind of bored as the player. I think the general idea and gesture is nice but now the execution needs a boost.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2Y1hCgDvNE Check this out for inspiration, it's not the greatest arrangement but also a waltzy piece.

A few more details:

b.9: fourth parallels between flute and clarinet, if they are intentional and you want that sound that is fine but they seem more accidental to me as they only occur there. They create imho a sound world that somehow doesn't fit in the rest of the piece. Also the decision to let the clarinet raise above the flute there for only a few bars makes it tricky to follow who is the leading line and it feels to me as if you are not sure as well what is the line to follow here.

b18 onwards: that bassoon line is very high and it is the perfect range for a lyrical horn line so I would exchange both parts.

Hope that helps, looking forward to the next version.

After Version 2:

Hi Adrian,

much better! I like the variety that you brought in, it definitely has a more interesting texture. I agree on the fact that the ending needs some work.

Here's a bit food for thought:

bar 11 onwards: not a great fan of oboe+flute and clarinet walking on top of each other, it makes it tricky to follow who's supposed to be the melodic lead and counteracts your melodic tendency, contrary motion in general is a great idea but not when the lines cross.

bar 27 onwards: support flute melody an octave lower with the oboe? feels a bit alone in that stratosphere up there.

bar 35 and particularly bar 43 onwards feels like it's lacking a clear coordination of what is a foreground element and what is accompaniment, i'm missing a clear idea there, problem persist until bar 59

bar 51: horn high d is a quite high register and will stick out like a sore thumb, I would avoid that

In general, you quite often have a few instances where melodic lines cross each other which makes it tricky to follow the main idea, while the lines themselves are nice, they kind of interfer a little too much with each other, I would try to clean that up a little.

After Version 3:

looks good so far. A few things:

b1: rename the horn to "Horn in F"

b17: Horn dynamic missing

b21-22: oboe under one slur

b31: clarinet should be half tone trill

b33 onwards: use regular staccato for clarinet

b84/86: horn ending doesn't agree with clar/oboe rhythmically

After Version 4:

thanks for the update. As soon as you consider this one finished       I will clean up a few graphical things.

A few more things:

Please add a Title and your Name as a composer to it.

Bar 1 onwards: Bassoon is currently tied to bar 2, should it       rather be slured like the other ones (also in the following bars)?       Also add staccato dots to bar 4 and 6 in this case so they all       align

Bar 25 onwards Bassoon: incosistencies in articulations intended?

Bar 31 Horn: make the first two notes quarter notes with staccato       dot, also in bar 30 end and 32, also 49-52

Bar 61: mf not necessary as we are at mf already

Bar 64: don't put dynamics in empty spaces, they should always be       under a note so move fl, horn, oboe, bsn to their next note

bar 80 onwards: shouldn't that mirror the beginning? if so       articulate it like the beginning (staccato dots, slurs etc., also       check bsn note lengths) From this point onwards I feel there are       generally missing a few staccato dots or articulations to make       that passage plausible with what you had before

bar 94: Horn length intended?

bar 105: again no mf necessary as we're coming from mf