Recent Modern music postings at ChoralWiki

A place for contemporary composers and others to discuss their works and issues of composing choral music in our time
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CHGiffen
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Location: Hudson, Wisconsin, USA

Recent Modern music postings at ChoralWiki

Post by CHGiffen »

I've created a page ChoralWiki:Newly available modern music scores at the ChoralWiki which provides a listing of all new Modern music scores at CPDL posted in the past 90 days.

It makes use of Template:New score pages in a simple manner. You might wish to use this template on your own User page (or User talk page), which accepts up to 5 category parameters, to track recent postings in other ways that might be of interest to you.
Charles H. Giffen
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carlos
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Re: Recent Modern music postings at ChoralWiki

Post by carlos »

Good idea, Chuck!
spartlan
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Re: Recent Modern music postings at ChoralWiki

Post by spartlan »

Thanks Chuck! This is great. I enjoyed checking out the new submissions. -Susan
cgz
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Joined: 11 Aug 2023 16:01

Re: Recent Modern music postings at ChoralWiki

Post by cgz »

I have a question for modern composers.

Even though I'm alive and composing, I have never felt comfortable in the dissonance heavy compositions of many modern composers. So, my question is: what draws you to compose in such a manner? What am I (who am not afraid to experiment) clearly missing in understanding what you write?

[For ILLUSTRATION PURPOSES ONLY, I have seen music of two composers featured in the archdiocese of San Francisco, and the music seems intentionally to shun consonance, places of rest, except, perhaps, at the very end of the piece.]
Cdalitz
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Joined: 24 Apr 2007 14:42

Re: Recent Modern music postings at ChoralWiki

Post by Cdalitz »

An answer to @cgz about the motivation for dissonance heavy compositions.

Dissonances can have many different functions:
  • a) They can be used to drag to some other chord (functional harmnonics in classical and romantic music or in modern popular music)
  • b) They can be used as expressive means, which only works when consonances are the rule, but there are examples from the late renaissance or baroque period that are very dissonance heavy. This was not only common in vocal music (e.g "flevit amare" in Charpentier's "Le reniment de St. Pierre") but also in intrumental music (there are movements in the "Sonate da chiesa" by Corelli which have dissonances on almost every good note but barely consonances on good notes exept for start and end).
  • c) They can be used to spice up a sound which is otherwise considered too "boring" by the performer or composer. Typical examples are the major 7th or 9th chords in jazz music.
  • d) They might be generally preferred over consonances by composers who consider consonances conventional and boring. The extreme form is the normative inversion In "cacophonic" music, but as it is also tied to the equally tempered scale, its use for merely vocal music is problematic because it is difficult or even impossible to achiev proper intonation. There are milder variants, of course, which can even be sung with pure intonation.
  • e) There are "dissonances" at the border to noise instead of harmony, which might serve special effects.
Dissonances can thus be used merely out of convention (a and c), as means to express the menaing of the text (b and e), or simply because the composer likes the sound (d).

I am not sure though, whether this is an answer to your question, which might just have been a rant about some music you considered unsuitable for the occasion.
cgz
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Joined: 11 Aug 2023 16:01

Re: Recent Modern music postings at ChoralWiki

Post by cgz »

Herr Dalitz,

To take your last point first, no: it's not just a rant about a piece I heard and didn't like.
I genuinely don't understand the modern use of dissonance. I'm alive now, and composing, and I use dissonance commonly, but not ubiquitously.

Thank you for your thoughtful exposition. I'm not sure that I will come to like the stuff, but your deploying both ancient and modern examples is helpful.

I'm blessed to have been told (at some point some time ago) that sanctity is beautiful and unique in each person, but sin is uniformly ugly and banal. My taste in music may not be that of other people I know, but it doesn't have to be, in order for there to beauty both in what I like and what they like.
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