Octavia's String Quartet

[Orchestral_Design]

Just a quick little piece I put together, Im using new VST's (virtual software instruments) Im quite happy with them, hopefully my future compositions will sound more realistic and lifelike. Im probably going to wait until some more episodes of season 2 come out to get some re-score ideas.

Im pretty new to making string quartets, usually write scores and things of that sort, but this is my first true classical piece.

[penguindf12]

Very keen! I did a string quartet for the last Remix War myself:



I tried to include as many string-y techniques as I could with the limited soundfonts I had. Now then, criticism:

You used solo violin for most of the tune -- usually string quartets focus on making a big "hyper-instrument" using all four strings to their fullest. Since Octavia plays cello (or its closest non-quartet analogue, the double bass), you should really give the cello a more important part -- I couldn't distinguish it from the viola!

The soundfonts you used for the cello & viola sound more like string SECTIONS than individual instruments. It's important to write for sounds that a "real" quartet could play -- meaning no more than 4 voices at a time, unless you write in double/triple stops, and even those need to be closely scrutinized to make sure they're actually playable by a live group.

I agree 100% with Dr. D regarding blocked chords - string quartets can do tons of contrapuntal stuff, and things like pizzicato, natural/artificial harmonics, etc! There is nice counterpoint between the first & second violins, however.

So! -- Just criticism of course, I really do enjoy it! What themes from the show were used (if any), and where would you want to take this if you developed it more?

Listen to these string quartets, they are incredible -- maybe you'll get an idea of what you can do with the medium:

Adagio for String Quartet, this one's really popular, and it may have a similar mood to your piece:


Bartok's String Quartet 4 Finale; sounds like King Crimson-esque rock music more than classical sometimes:


Alban Berg's Lyric Suite movement 3 has a ton of interesting "effects" for string quartet, it really shows what the medium can do, especially as far as creepiness:


So yeah, these are some of my favorites, and really cool as far as showing what you can do with string quartet!