Timeline for How should I notate an intermediate dynamic between mp and mf?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
13 events
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| Aug 26, 2019 at 4:33 | comment | added | aparente001 | @Walter - Try it. Look at the score of some orchestral piece you're fond of. Mark the places where there's f and then fff. Listen to a recording. Is that really where the precision lies? Maybe sometimes, I would guess, but not always. Once I had the good luck to have a composer, George Walker, come listen to a rehearsal of my youth orchestra's work on one of his pieces. His comment each and every time the conductor asked him for feedback was "We need to hear more from the trombone section. More trombone, please!" To me, it all boils down to MORE! or LESS! | |
| Aug 25, 2019 at 22:37 | comment | added | Walter | (Final comment here since it says this discussion’s getting too long) Yeah, thinking about dynamics more relatively is something I plan to implement in my scores. Though I still want to think that whilst the line may be blurry between neighboring dynamics (ff and fff), there should be a clear difference between, say, f and fff, at least depending on how you define them (f = loudly vs. fff = at the top of your voice, etc.). | |
| Aug 25, 2019 at 22:27 | comment | added | aparente001 | ... I will think about more than before or less than before. Also a whole lot more than before or a whole lot less than before. | |
| Aug 25, 2019 at 22:27 | comment | added | aparente001 | ... the subjective experience of dynamics, when one is playing, is very much analog, not digital. You can't dial in a "pp" or an "mf." What you can do is think, this part needs to be loud, how am I going to accomplish that, I will get closer to the bridge and allow the sound to get a little bit scratchy, remembering that the scratch will not be heard out in the hall, I will use arm weight (right arm), I will divide up the long notes and change bow a whole lot, I will adjust the angle of the bow so I have a lot of hair contacting the string. And vice versa for soft. For gradations, | |
| Aug 25, 2019 at 22:22 | comment | added | aparente001 | @Walter - If you look at a method book for beginning string players, at a music shop, you'll see that bowing instructions are given pretty precisely, with "upper half" for example. The down - up natural dynamics are a fact of life for string players. You try to use it to "sand with the grain" so to speak when you can, and when you can't, you have to work to go against it. // Let me know later if you have any follow-up questions. // General comment: I think that in general you may be assuming performers have more precise notches of volume than they actually have. The truth is that ... | |
| Aug 25, 2019 at 21:39 | comment | added | Walter | Your second paragraph (along with your bowing comment on my question) is what I was asking for more information about, yes. I’m still thinking about what to do with the information I’ve been given. | |
| Aug 25, 2019 at 15:19 | comment | added | aparente001 | Do you have any questions about the suggestion I made in the second paragraph of my answer? | |
| Aug 25, 2019 at 15:16 | comment | added | aparente001 | Good string players can play legato even when changing bow. Write "legato." Alternatively you can have them change bow in a strange place. Try this. Get a dowel rod or fairly straight tree branch (peeled of bark), the diameter of a fat kindergarten pencil, with the length of a cello bow. Use your left index finger (palm down) to simulate the string. Practice bowing. Sing some nice cello parts while you "bow" them. When you go up bow, let your volume increase. When you go down bow, let it decrease. Let this become second nature. Then you will be able to write bowings in your parts. | |
| Aug 25, 2019 at 4:09 | comment | added | Walter | Then taking bowing into consideration, how would you suggest I write it so that the notes in the swells all have smooth transitions, except from one swell to the next (as currently indicated by the slurs)? Also, renting is not feasible for me, I’m afraid. | |
| Aug 25, 2019 at 3:51 | comment | added | aparente001 | @Walter - When you play an up bow stroke (from tip to frog) there is a natural tendency to get louder. When you play a "down bow," the sound naturally gets gradually softer as you get closer to the tip. An experience string player works out the optimal bowing pattern on either the first reading or pretty soon thereafter. You can generally tell whether the person who wrote out the part knew what he was doing. If he didn't, then you just work out your own bowing according to your musical judgment. Why don't you rent a student cello for a month and experiment? | |
| Aug 25, 2019 at 2:36 | comment | added | Walter | Responding to both this answer and your comment above: I’m not sure I understand your comments about bowing, though that may just be that I don’t understand bowing that well. Why wouldn’t a player just play & bow the instrument as written in the excerpt, if I want a smooth (legato) transition between the notes? | |
| Aug 25, 2019 at 1:15 | history | edited | aparente001 | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
added another idea
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| Aug 25, 2019 at 0:43 | history | answered | aparente001 | CC BY-SA 4.0 |