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This piece was pretty monumental, for what I was able to do in terms of structural variation, as well as purpose and audience (involvement and reception).
I wrote this piece for a school project, in my English class sophomore year of high school. An alternate, tongue-in-cheek title for this one was "A Separate Piece"—the book we had read was A Separate Peace. The main character is Finny, as he is referred to in the first half of the book, short for Phineas, which is what he's called in the second half of the book. The first half of the book is much more light-hearted and fun, while the second half (which occurs after he falls down a flight of stairs and injures himself) (symbolized by my flurrying cadenza down the keyboard) is a lot darker and sadder. Finny/Phineas eventually dies at the end of the story. Oops, #1959LiteratureSpoilers.
The piece is simple in structure, following an A B C B'A' pattern, which is self-reflective.
I wrote the last part of the piece first, as it arose from a chord I misread from a jazz lead sheet. It was around this time that I began my private jazz piano lessons, and I added quite a lot of fairly sophisticated harmonies to the piece, most apparent in the B' section.
D (D Major) —> Dmaj7 (D Major 7)
B- (B Minor) —> B-7 (B Minor 7)
Basically, I added in tons of sevenths, altered some left hand chords, and ended the entire piece on a B-9 chord, which to this day is still my favorite chord, especially when played in the lower register of the keyboard (which I actually don't do in "A Separate Piece").
This was also the first composition of mine that I shared with people other than my family and close friends. I recorded the piece and played it for my class at school, after reading my short essay that explained the relevance to our book.
I felt so awkward, just standing at the front of the room, while my piano music played from our teacher's stereo for all my classmates' judging ears. I remember after the music stopped, my teacher jumped up and applauded, a huge smile across his face. My class seemed to enjoy it a lot, too, and it was those encouraging moments that made me consider taking this whole composition thing a little more seriously.
Another moment of validation around this time in my life was when I first started those jazz piano theory composition arrangement lessons, and my new teacher (at the time) had listened to one of my pieces (not featured in this album actually!) and closed his eyes, nodded his head, gently pinching his chin. He finally had said, "That was... So... Nice." I remember feeling so joyful after that first lesson, and after playing it for my classmates, that outside support definitely helped me.
I feel very grateful for that particular English teacher, whose eccentric nature and boundless creativity produced a "menu" of post-book project options, which included writing an essay, making a 3D model, painting a picture, doing an interpretive dance, writing a song, etc.
I absolutely love how dark and dramatic the second half of the piece is, with all the luscious harmonies and unexpected chords. The ending is particularly dramatic, with the open chords and melodic repetition.
I remember when the middle theme came to me—while I was walking down the stairs of my house, the bouncy little melody arrived into my head, so I ran back to my room to figure it out.
What comes to mind when I reflect upon this piece?
Audience. Confidence. Sophistication. Validation + Motivation. Harmonic + Structural Development. Comedy / Drama. Unsettled chord tones in the beginning, crunchy but somehow more pleasant at the end.
While this piece starts out light and finishes heavy and dark, the next piece—also for an English project for the same teacher, but my junior year of high school—starts out unsure and pensive, then...