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Hello everyone

Here's my newest composition, a quintet for amplified soprano, clarinet, cello, percussion and prepared piano, called "Die Menschheit" ("humanity"), on a poem by German expressionist poet August Stramm. The performance was great, but the recording is a bit rough around the edges (I only had a Zoom H4 and particularly the soprano is not quite as audible as she was in concert).

Anyway, here it is: http://chirb.it/afbhgA

Please let me know what you think.

I'd make sure your link works before you post it here.

It did, but I had to remove it because Mixcloud insists on following any piece of music with another one that is totally random and most likely not fitting at all.

So I had to find a new hosting site, here's the new link:

http://chirb.it/afbhgA

This is not a style a music I am particularly familiar with so I don't feel I can give a useful critique. However, I will provide my impressions. I get the sense that this is well done. It sounds like a mature piece of music. It is very haunting, mysterious, even rather creepy. It is not really something I would listen to in my spare time, necessarily, but also it is quite interesting. To me, it feels somewhat repetitive, what I listened to of it anyways, not because the music doesn't change but because I can't really latch on to what's going on harmonically. Like I said, I am not familiar with this style, I'm not sure if it's atonal or what but my ear just isn't trained for this kind of music.

My girlfriend listened to this with me and she really liked it. She said it reminds her of Dresden Dolls, which I think is a strange comparison but I sort of see where she is coming from. Some of the vocal rhythms reminded me a little bit of punk rock, or some 80s band, or something.

I didn't hear the whole thing, just the first five minutes, not sure if the music drastically changes at some point but here you have my impression of what I heard. Hope this helps in some way.

Oh by the way the prepared piano sounds are great. Very eerie effects. And the vocalist seems like she's really into it, which is good.

Hi, mrenaud! Well, after a first listening, I felt that I had to see what the poem "Die Menschheit" was all about -- and was surprised to see that it is a poem that "reads" very musically, and cries out for a musical setting of some sort. I can tell you that your approach was very reminiscent of the American composer Harry Partch -- a man who invented his own instruments and who set, among other things, various graffiti scrawlings to music (in his "Barstow, California" composition). It also reminded me of some of George Crumb's most recent work, in which he has set various American folksongs using his highly unique, and highly subtle, instrumentation.

I confess to not being much of a fan of Sprechstimme -- but I thought the piece was rhythmically very incisive, chock-full of interesting sonorities, and moved logically in accordance with the implications of the poem. Thanks for sharing this!

Wow! Thanks for sharing this, mrenaud. I found it very involving. Like Tim, I looked up the poem afterwards, but I understood enough of the words on first listening to get some of the drift, I think. Particularly liked the last 2 minutes or so. I was feeling a bit jaded about PW (how much Chopin can you take?) but this really engaged me (as did a previous work of yours which you posted some time ago). I'll be listening to it again!