COMPOSER SPOTLIGHT: DAVID TOCKNELL
Many Shades of Light & Dark
David Tocknell is a dear friend, composer, educator and violist that we are lucky enough to work with premiering his work, Many Shades of Light and Dark. You can watch a video of our live performance for our concert Greyscale, part of Konzertprojekt's Vivid Sydney series, Light Qualities.
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Many Shades of Light and Dark involves some pretty out-there stuff! While writing this piece for us, David found out we were experimenting with singing and playing our instruments at the same time - inspired in part by artists such as Monique Clare. Listen to what David's written for us in the second movement (around 3:00 on the video).
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Everyone writes music in different ways, so we decided to ask David a bit more about how he chose to write Many Shades of Light and Dark.
Take a look at Connor's interview with him, get inspired, then scroll down for some ideas on how to get started experimenting with your instrument!
For You:
We learnt a lot from performing this piece and talking to David about composing by experimenting on our instruments.
We've put together some challenges for you to try out at home with your instrument - you can experiment with singing and playing, beatboxing and playing, and maybe use those new skills in a composition! Check them out below:
Mild: Sing & Play
Challenge yourself by learning how to use your voice to play along with your instrument!
These exercises were based on some cool things we learnt with the awesome cellist singer-songwriter Monique Clare.
You can check out Monique's music here.
Challenge yourself by learning how to use your voice to play along with your instrument!
These exercises were based on some cool things we learnt with the awesome cellist singer-songwriter Monique Clare.
You can check out Monique's music here.
Medium: Beatbox & Play
Spicy: Start Your Own Composition!
The first step to composing is improvising. Improvising means making up music on the spot. It isn't completely random though, we make some decisions beforehand.
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For this activity, we'll use pentatonic scales, just like David - which look like this:
G Pentatonic Scale
(G A B D E G)
G Minor Pentatonic Scale
(G Bb C D F G)
David also helped us by talking about Structure. He uses a lot of repetition; playing the same ideas but changing them slightly each time.
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Some ways we can change a musical idea include:
Pitch
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Change one of the notes.
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Register: play the same thing but higher or lower.
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Contour: change the shape of the melody.
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Scale: change what set of notes you use.
Texture
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Play two or more notes at once.
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Change the number of instruments playing.
Rhythm
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Use longer or shorter notes.
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Add or take away rests.
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Add a new rhythmic pattern.
Dynamics
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Gradually play louder or softer.
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Create swells with your melody.
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Suddenly play loud or soft.
Fragmentation
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Take a small idea from your melody and repeat it, then add new ideas to it!
Tone Colour
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Find a new way of playing your idea on your instrument to create a new sound (e.g. pizzicato, legato, staccato sul tasto).
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Make your sound more thick or thin.
These are only a few ideas, and there's no need to try all of them at once!
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Choose from one of the pictures below for some inspiration.
All of the pictures have many of the same objects that are slightly different, just like David's composition.
"Swiss Alps" by Lomacar is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0
"13,000 ft" by Shreyans Bhansali is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0
"Castle Rock" by Ian Capper is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0
"Swiss Alps" by Lomacar is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0
Use one of the backing tracks below, and the G pentatonic scales to improvise.
Record your improvisations on your phone or laptop so you don't forget your great musical ideas!
Note: The second backing track changes from G Pentatonic (0:00 - 0:30), to G Minor Pentatonic (0:31 - 0:47), to G Pentatonic (0:48 - 1:10).
For an idea of what an improvisation might look like with these backing tracks, check out this folk-inspired improvisation based on the first picture.
Listen out for what stays the same and what changes!