Choose your own adventure: Mood/Mode

You’re the star of the story! Choose from 40 possible endings reads the cover The Cave of Time, the first volume in Bantam Books’s Choose Your Own Adventure series. About two years ago, I thought it would be neat to make a piece of music which was guided by choice. Mood/Mode is the first fruit of that effort. The piece consists of an introduction followed by eight possible sections which each represent a mood, an emotion reflected in the music. Each section is based on a different musical mode, a set of notes forming a scale and the basis of the harmony for that section. As the piece progresses, soloists cue the next section by playing a cadenza based on the mode for the next mood. If a mood is repeated, new material is added. Once the final section is signaled, ending music (different for each of the eight moods) is played. There are more than 16.7 million possible sequences for a performance, but at the premiere, we did just two (recordings below).

Each student received two pages for their part--one contained the introduction, selectable sections, and endings, while the other showed the eight modes used and a sample cadenza for each. The sections were color-coded (and labeled with the mode name and measure number) to make it easier to see how they were paired (and find the right spot more easily in performance).

The band only had about two weeks to put the piece together from start to finish, and I was still revising up until a couple days before the premiere. The most challenging part of rehearsal was helping the students know what section of the piece was coming next. The soloists did an excellent job of playing confidently and within the mode, but it was tricky to make sure the band would be ready to start playing as soon as the cadenza ended. I found that it helped to give some visual cues to the band (and especially specific players who started a section) so that we stayed on track.

Take a listen and let me know what you think about the concept and the music.

Educationally, there were several valuable things about this piece. It was great to feature student soloists and allow them the opportunity for some improvisation. Keeping the band engaged in listening was also good (and somewhat difficult!). For the future, I would love to spend more time on the modes to help students hear them more quickly. Also, depending on the ensemble, I might want to spend more time discussing the relationship between the modes and moods. With my current Concert Band, we have already done a lot of discussion on this topic (including a seminar on Plato's thoughts on the ways music influences emotions). I picked the moods based on what I hear, but others may not hear as I do.

If you didn't see it on the image above, here are the modes used:

1. Octatonic
2. Slavic Dorian
3. Locrian
4. Minor Pentatonic
5. Diminished Whole Tone
6. Whole Tone
7. Mixolydian
8. Dominant Bebop

Concert Type vs. Audience Size

Each time a concert rolls around, I wonder what the audience is going to look like. Here is some data*.

View fullsize

*okay, I made up the data

Prince Music + Instruments (Review)

Readers of this blog may note that I have tried a number of instruments from overseas and given some favorable reviews to a number of them. Since I'm looking out for a relatively small budget while trying to build up the instrument inventory and the whole band program at a newer school, I have to consider cost as a critical factor on any purchase. This has led to a pretty open mind and lots of trying of new things. For this week, I'd like to describe my experience at Prince Music Company a few weeks ago.

A couple families have asked me about the instruments carried by Prince Music, so I wanted to check out what they offer in person. The prices are comparable to some other dealers on the low end, but having a more local connection to dealers like this would be nice. Prince Music carries the most common starting instruments for band (as well as strings, though I won't be dealing with those since I don't have the expertise to do so) in up to three different models: student, student+, and intermediate.

[Why do we designate instruments this way? There are some "beginner" instruments which are fine for a student to play through high school. Also, having "professional" features on a "beginner" instrument may be a brilliant marketing tactic, but having a high-F# key on a 5th grader's saxophone is like putting 5-disc CD change on your kid's tricycle..]

I tried quite a few instruments--basically all the models available for flute, clarinet, alto and tenor sax, trumpet, and trombone. The branding appeared to be either Slade or Etude on all instruments, and several were labeled "made in China." There were marked differences between the lines (Student vs Student+ vs intermediate), and the short story of the review is to stay away from the regular Student models. 

Student

No serial numbers. Poor quality craftsmanship (evidenced by some misshapen parts, like a pad holder on a clarinet and sloppy soldering on the brass instruments). Hard to tell if the sluggish valves on the trumpet were due to mishandling or something else, but the Student line instruments all felt worse than the ones I am used to playing. Pitch was more or less fine (adequate on everything except the saxophone--as I have found common on the low end saxophones, the upper octave gets sharper and sharper the higher you go up). I brought all my own mouthpieces and reeds, so I assume that the stock mouthpieces would only sound worse (since that has been my experience so often before).

Student+

You could start a beginner on these instruments. Though I have questions remaining about how long they would last, I didn't find anything terribly wrong with the instruments in this line. The quality of the bracing and soldering on the trumpet was noticeably better. Everyone likes having a serial number on their instrument, so that's another plus! The saxophone Student+ is only $50 more than the student model, and that extra $50 gets you something that is perhaps worthwhile to play. While I think there are better options out there, the Student+ models that I tried would at least be okay to start a student on.

Intermediate

I'm really not sure what the real-world difference between "Intermediate" and any other type of instrument is. The term seems to be used to push people into a more expensive purchase with the illusion of quality. You don't want a professional instrument yet? Okay, how about something at the intermediate level?

In the case of the Intermediate instruments at Prince Music, I found very little separating them from the Student+ line. When I pick up my own Bach Stradivarius (model 37), I immediately notice some pretty significant differences compared to my Getzen-made trumpet. The differences between the Student+ and Intermediate level instruments seemed to be negligible. For instance, both the Student+ and Intermediate trumpets have a rose-brass lead pipe. Does the Intermediate instrument have a better tone? Maybe, but it would take more side-by-side playing to figure it out, and if you're wanting to do that, you probably don't want to be looking at the cheapest line of instruments you can find.

Summary

While the Student+ (and Intermediate) instruments tended to play fine, the considerably lower quality of the Student line raises doubts in my mind about all the instruments. I would not want a student on one of the Student instruments, and I would also be hesitant to try buying one of the others without some sort of guarantee on it.