Simplify!

[rhu]

So I just diagrammed the structure of one of the movements of PDZ that's been giving me trouble. I have fifteen thematic elements in a movement that's 216 measures long. Perhaps that's why the middle feels unsatisfying.

And harmonically I'm spending too much time in D. There are 24 bars in e minor, 20 in a minor, but the rest are either D major, D minor, or B minor (which might as well be D). While I was going for a more through-composed feel and trying to avoid sonata allegro formulaicism in this movement, I may have overcompensated.

Sigh. The hardest part of composing is ripping out something you've been living with for a long, long time and then composing something different without slipping back into what didn't work the first time. (Come to think of it, that's also why I have a hard time composing crossword puzzles.)

Although in this case I think there's a strategy that may help: I should start by taking any thematic element that occurs only once, saving it for another piece, and seeing if one of the more prominent elements in the movement can be made to fit the affected lyrics.

Comments

[angwantibo.livejournal.com]

Two things. First, it took Brahms decades to write his first symphony. It's ok if it takes a lot of time and a lot of rework. You're a perfectionist. Second, 15 thematic elements is an awful lot. Doesn't Brahm's 1st and Beethoven's 9th really only have 1?

I like your idea of removing displaced themes. Instead of trying to replace them with the major elements, would making variations on the major elements make a better substitution?

[530nm330hz.livejournal.com]

I know 15 is too many. I didn't realze I had 15 until I attempted to diagram the movement.

I'm not fretting about how long the project is taking. (Well, I am a little, but after 12 years, what's another few months, right?) I'm just frustrated because this is the part I find the hardest --- I need to rewrite just a part of a movement without letting the setting I've listened to hundreds of times affect my creativity.

But I put in a few hours on it last night and I can see improvement already.

Yeah, that.

[michelel72.livejournal.com]

If it's any comfort, in my recent rereading of my fragmentary Great American Novel (only 11 years in progress but 8 years overdue), I found several occurrences of misplaced passages and inadequately established emotional themes. Unfortunately, I had built other passages around those, so extraction will be ... unfun. I don't exactly follow your technical details, but ... I feel ya, brother.