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Creative Orchestration (Course description, April 2012) by Leonardo Balada This course is a follow up to Orchestration II (in which the students orchestrate fragments of already existing compositions for piano, encompassing classical, romantic, nationalist, impressionist, neoclassic, atonal and avant-garde-aleatoric styles). In Creative Orchestration students orchestrate their own ideas thinking orchestrally and writing directly for the orchestra. Throughout the course the students have to write their exercises in a traditional music language and in a contemporary-avant-garde one. There is discussion of art and its parallels in compositional styles: impressionism, cubism, surrealism, abstract expressionism, collage etc. At the end of the course, students should be able to achieve the following: 1. Orchestrate their-own ideas directly for the orchestra. 2. Demonstrate their technical versatility with the two extremes of the music spectrum. There are several steps from the start to the end of the semester’s work: 1. Discussion and example-analysis of orchestral textures. The students write several measures with their own ideas in a traditional language, and also in a contemporary one for full orchestra. These textures are: timber blending, contrast of pitch locale, contrast of articulation, overlapping, pointillism, motion as sustaining floor, monophonic texture, choral texture, polyphonic texture, contrast of chord and line, homophonic texture, polythematic texture, polyrhythmic texture and spectral and onomatopoeic texture. In the onomatopoeic exercise the students have to transcribe real sounds and noises from the outside world and reproduce them with sounds of the orchestra in as realistic a manner as possible (not an artistic one) forcing them to assess the orchestral possibilities. By outside world I mean things as diverse as the sound of an accordion, street traffic, rain, a flamenco guitar etc. 2. “Mood” character composing exercises, again in the traditional and contemporary mold. Among the composing exercises the students write some of the following: 1. the beginning of two waltzes , the first in the style of Johannes Strauss with all its glamorous touches, exquisite melodies, sensual orchestration and the second a very contemporary one in which the concept of a waltz is stretched in form, sounds and rhythm. 2. the composition of the beginning of two funeral marches, a traditional one and a contemporary one. 3. composing two fragments of funny music, one traditional the other contemporary. 4. composing two fragments in which horror is suggested in traditional and contemporary orchestral sounds etc. Depending on the time available, other subjects are added. 3. Surrealistic writing. Here the exercises stress gradual transformation of the music: A. From one mood or structure to another very different one. B. From one style-traditional- to a very contemporary one not only in its technique but also in the orchestral sounds. 4. Cubistic interpretations. The students look at the “Las Meninas”, a painting by Spanish classic artist Velazquez and compare it with the cubistic recreation of the same painting by Picasso. Similarly, the students take a classical orchestral composition-Haydn, Mozart or another composer- and recompose it in an avant-garde style. 5. Collage, composing contemporary textures as a painter would do following the art of Rauschenberg. 6. Given a short text for chorus and solo voice, the students must: A. analyze the content, character and prosody of the text. B. compose an introduction for orchestra that prepares the psychological atmosphere of the forthcoming entrance of the chorus and helps in a technical and practical way its entrance. C. compose the music for the chorus, with the orchestra supporting or challenging the singers depending on the text. D. compose the music for the vocal soloist who may or may not alternate with the chorus, depending on the text. Special attention is given to technical peculiarities of the choral and vocal writing as well as the advantages and disadvantages of the orchestra’s presence in the music. If time allows, other exercises are assigned such as: 1. To orchestrate a C Major Chord using a full orchestra in: A. open chord position pp (classic and contemporary- using unconventional orchestral sound production-), B. The same but ff. C. The same in close position pp D. The same but ff. 2. Make a piano reduction of a complex existing contemporary composition for chorus and orchestra. The exercise is intended for the students to synthesize the essential elements of the existing music using the constraints of a piano for practical rehearsal situations. It should provide the chorus with the important elements from the orchestra like pitch, cues, and other essential elements in the orchestra. This course is taught by the teacher exclusively, without the aid of a T.A.