# My non-traditional compositions



## Richannes Wrahms

This thread will be dedicated to the topic of the title.

My most liked composition so far is For Cello

My most recent attempt is Four simple slow episodes for string sextet.


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## Phil loves classical

The sextet sounds great. I thought the sonorities were really nice, and it was moody. The cello piece has a nice melodic line. I would like to hear larger and more sudden changes in dynamics. It sounds like you're using a continuous meter, I think it would be nice to inject some more jarring rhythms, even though I think you want to achieve a pastoral sort of feel.


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## Richannes Wrahms

Moment, for 8 players


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## Richannes Wrahms

I've been trying to create a personal set of counterpoint rules. This is one attempt.


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https://soundcloud.com/richannes-wrahms%2Fnew-counterpoint-for-oboe-viola-and-cello


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## Richannes Wrahms

String Quartet No.4


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## Richannes Wrahms

A very tonal introduction for a String Quartet I might expand.


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## Zeus

do you have any scores? Midi is unbearable


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## Richannes Wrahms

This is the score

View attachment Introduction to string quartet.pdf


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## Phil loves classical

It's moody and has nice harmony. I'm thinking the cello shouldn't go up to the treble in bar 18. The bass sounds like it just disappears suddenly. I think the melody shifts between the viola and cello too suddenly and with too large a leap without a smooth transition, which sounds awkward to me.


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## Richannes Wrahms

Another tonal intro for a string quartet.

Unfolding


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## Richannes Wrahms

^ kinda finished it, it's not long, listen if you are curious. Here is the (terribly unedited) score:


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## Richannes Wrahms

More readable score


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## Richannes Wrahms

I started yet another string quartet in a new rather dissonant style, might be only computer playable. Tell me what you think.

Broken glass

working score:


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## Phil loves classical

I'd watch the way the parts move together before you continue. Is this with the counterpoint rules you developed, that you mentioned earlier? I found it pretty rough. It's not the dissonance.


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## Richannes Wrahms

These are different counterpoint rules. 

Melodically everything is allowed except the octave, the tritone and the outlining of triads. 

Vertically, no octave doubling is allowed. Direct (and parallel) fifths are prohibited. Soft dissonances are approached in contrary or oblique motion. Hard dissonances only by oblique motion. (No parallel dissonances of the same type.) No resolution required.


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## Richannes Wrahms

I've been hard at work with this, I think it is my best so far. I'd gladly recieve (more) criticisms so I can continue expanding it.

Concerto for 6 musicians


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## Phil loves classical

You captured an interesting mood. Are you using your own counterpoint rules? I think you should focus more on the voice leading instead. There are parts I feel that are garbled up between voices like between 0:40 to 0:50.


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## Richannes Wrahms

Yep, same counterpoint rules I used in "broken glass", now I take more care not to clutter the textures too much or I enter another kind of territory.


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## Richannes Wrahms

So I've expanded it and written some more parts over it. Probably didn't solve any of the rough voice leading problems you find in the piece.

Chamber Concerto


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## Richannes Wrahms

Here it is with noteperformer and showing the ugly score.


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## Richannes Wrahms

I've been working on this for a while now. Pending revision/expansion.

Quintet (for flute, english horn, bass clarinet, cello and double bass)


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## Richannes Wrahms

A different work finished.


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## Richannes Wrahms

This is what became of the Quintet


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## Richannes Wrahms

For Recorder

A simple short piece for soprano or tenor recorder. Probably doesn't deserve a YouTube video.


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## Richannes Wrahms

Butterflies for tenor recorder


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## Phil loves classical

What kind of scale are you using? Still on your own counterpoint rules? That's some tonguing action at 1:53!


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## Richannes Wrahms

I composed that by ear mostly, not repeating pitches much unless it's motivic, no tritones.


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## Phil loves classical

Richannes Wrahms said:


> I composed that by ear mostly, not repeating pitches much unless it's motivic, no tritones.


I think it's a mistake to avoid the tritone. Right now your piece sounds very diatonic, but at the same time, very shaky and unstable, since it has no tonal centre. And because you avoid the tritone it keeps meandering or shifting about in what becomes a sort of arbitrary way. Even if you don't want the music to sound tonal, you have to establish some kind of backbone. The tritone is perfect for keeping tonal ambiguity, but a certain stability.


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## Richannes Wrahms




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## Richannes Wrahms

A short and simple piece.

Flute, Horn and Cello


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## Phil loves classical

Richannes Wrahms said:


> A short and simple piece.
> 
> Flute, Horn and Cello


An idea came to my head, that if you played around with the parts in slightly different meters, tuplet values, or cycles (more polyrhythmic, kind of like Boulez's San Maitre), and time the cycles to converge sometimes like in those sustained notes together, it could achieve an added dimension. You have a more singular pulse, currently, and the music suggests a certain freedom to me beyond that single pulse (even though I think you already staggered the beats sometimes with pauses, sustains or different meters for the parts together as a whole).


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## Richannes Wrahms

Just composed something in a similar vein to that last work. Faster and a bit more complex, no tuplets though.

Flute, Alto Flute, Horn


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## ollv

Hi, do you have some piano composition ?


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## Richannes Wrahms

Sadly no. I find it hard to compose for piano.


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## Richannes Wrahms

Doing some dissonant experimentation again, also with rhythm .


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https://soundcloud.com/richannes-wrahms%2Fstring-quartet-thing-2


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## Enthalpy

Richannes Wrahms said:


> Flute, Alto Flute, Horn


I hope the alto flute can be amplified. Gives it chance to be heard together with a horn.


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## Richannes Wrahms

I started something that make take a while to complete if I do, so here is a preview:

Complexification


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## Richannes Wrahms

After quite a dry spell.


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## Richannes Wrahms




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## Phil loves classical

I find the voices a bit hard to follow and inconsistent. You have a string of smaller intervallic changes, then some large leaps in different directions, and voices crossing abruptly. I think maybe it's the constantly varying direction of different voices lines, which makes it not clear whether it's expanding or contracting.


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## Richannes Wrahms

(probably be revised later)


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## Richannes Wrahms

Revised and expanded.


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## Richannes Wrahms

In Memoriam for Cello


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## Richannes Wrahms

Written in the course of a few days:


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## mikeh375

^^^^I liked it's expressive power in places. I'd say the bowings could be better thought out, certainly in relation to the dynamics and hairpins, but what is there does give a sense of what is required of the music and the player, who will go on to alter bowing as he/she sees fit.

My criticism would be that although there is melodic invention, there is no other idiomatic invention. Do you think you where led by sample limitation?


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## Richannes Wrahms

Thank you and yes, given that it will take years before I have the chance of working with performers I'm limited by the midi. The ligatures I tend to use more as rhythmic contour markers than actual bowings.


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## hammeredklavier

They sound like a cross between Wrahms and Bagner


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## Richannes Wrahms

Another spurt of inspiration and a bit of reworking yielded this:


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## Richannes Wrahms

Two miniatures for piano:

Arpeggiando

For Piano


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## Richannes Wrahms

After some time trying, I've come up with a new set of ideas to play with, to be developed later.


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