# Does this sound like a dramatic religious piece of music?



## Gondur

I'd like someone with time on their hands to check my chords please! I want to add solo sections but what you hear now are the main sections. Does the piece make musical sense? I like the ending as it's quite artistic and measure 15 and 37 sound very nice too. I want to do an ascending bit where I am from C major up to G major - > D major then B minor but the piece seems like a big circle of fifth so I need solo sections and I have a few melodies in mind for them.


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https://soundcloud.com/user305636706%2Fdramatic-religious-piece


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## KenOC

Perhaps this should be posted in the "Today's Composers" forum...?


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## Gondur

KenOC said:


> Perhaps this should be posted in the "Today's Composers" forum...?


Maybe a moderator can move it as I was not aware of that forum's existence.


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## KenOC

Gondur said:


> Maybe a moderator can move it as I was not aware of that forum's existence.


Click on "Forum" up top and you can see all the forums (or fora, or sub-forums, or whatever they're called).


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## Crudblud

Please explain to me what aspect of this music was designed to sound "religious".


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## Gondur

Crudblud said:


> Please explain to me what aspect of this music was designed to sound "religious".


The circle of fifth, the ending and measure 15 and 37. The ending is like the end of vivaldi nulla in mundo pax sincera


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## Crudblud

Gondur said:


> The circle of fifth, the ending and measure 15 and 37. The ending is like the end of vivaldi nulla in mundo pax sincera


And what makes that piece religious: the music itself, or the text?


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## Gondur

Crudblud said:


> And what makes that piece religious: the music itself, or the text?


Well I listened to a lot of 'religious' music - is that even the right word for it? I guess Sacred Baroque music. I listened to a lot of Vivaldi's Dixit Dominus and such and his music is always yearning for something. I don't know if that's the 7th chords as my theory is quite limited but in this piece, I thought the feel of the music at measure 15 and 37 gave a religious vibe in my mind and the ending especially. It reminded of ascending and being judged by God it was a particular chord with the A in the treble clef! Or God forgiving everyone for their Sins. Just that measure in particular seems divine to me. I am not religious just to let you know but I find the music 'musically enjoyable'. But when I composed it I tried to think about God and the divine as Bach or Vivaldi would have.

I get a similar feeling as I do with measure 15 and 37 listening to the cadence at 0:15 in this piece


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## PetrB

From what you have said in subsequent posts in this thread, it seems to me _you are thinking that certain theoretical aspects denote "religious"_ That is a near complete fallacy, and not the way to go about it at all.

Certainly, some styles of voice-leading and but a few common practice cadences are associated with choral music, and more specifically religious choral music, while those same elements are found in as many or more non-religious works.

*Application of mere theoretical elements do not make a piece religious.* I'm aware you are at the beginning, and quite excited you can make anything sound a little bit like a baroque work, but you are at the beginning, with much more to learn and put into practice before you can bend and shape the music you write to your will and make it personally expressive of whatever it is you do want to express.

Right now, I think "Your eyes are bigger than your stomach," i.e. scale the appetite of your current ambition to write any large work, let alone a 'grand / dramatic religious' piece. Since school is out for the summer (and as much as you are currently immersed in writing in an imitative period style) try instead to write something more in a style of your own.

You don't even know, I think, what your own style is yet, so making something following your own impulses, using your ear first rather than thinking theory first, will teach you a lot. _I think your goal should be to not write anything so directly 'baroque-like.'_

Often, there is just not time for this sort of work during a school year with all your course work needing to be done. Summer, then, is the time for 'your own work.'


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