Peter Ilych Tchaikovsky (1840 - 1893) was a Russian Classical Music Composer. He was considered as one of the best Russian composer of all time. His musical works are including : Symphonies, Ballets, Operas, and Overtures. Some of his famous fabulous compositions are The Nutcracker Suite, Swan Lake Ballet Suite, Romeo and Juliet Overture, Symphony no 6 (Pathetique), and Piano Concerto no 1.
'Swan Lake' was a ballet performance which story was based on Russian folk tales. It consisted of four parts. The story was about a princess who was turned into a swan because of a sorcerer's curse. The ballet performance premiere was in 1877 at Bolshoi Theater. It was informed that Tchaikovsky spent around one full year to complete the song, despite that he tried to finish the composition as soon as possible. The 'Swan Lake' premiere was not well-received by the public and Tchaikovsky music, as one of the elements, was also included on the negative comments. It was perceived that the music composition was too complicated and too difficult for the dance. Even the original composition of Swan Lake was initially receive negative comments, currently the 'Swan Lake' suite was recognized as one of Tchaikovsky's brilliant works that brought him to one of the most important ballet composers. Source : - Wikipedia - classicalmusic.about.com Below is a famous scene theme from Tchaikovsky 'Swan Lake' Ballet suite with my own piano composition. Played by me on piano.
Here we go again with another post in a new month. I feel like there was a quiet long time span since my last post, wasn't it ? However, this viral disease is slowing down my progress in making and exploring compositions, and creating blog post.
As we step further, this time i want to post my exploration result of a complicated composition. I cannot ignore this composition even i had done finishing it a few months ago, as the composition took quiet efforts in getting it done. It took around four months for me to complete exploring this composition, beside my other activities. When i finalized the arrangement, convert it into audio file and arrange the video file, I felt pretty satisfied and comfortable with the result, as simultaneously feeling unbelievable that I could done such arrangement.
The song is "Say Anything". Another popular ballad song from the legendary band X-Japan. The song was originally had ballad rock melody. However, many X-Japan songs had another versions afterwards. Yoshiki Hayashi, the leader, was the one who composed this song, and also the classical version that i explored and posted on this blog. The original song was released in 1991. Moreover, Yoshiki created the orchestral version of "Say Anything" and featured the song on his classical album, "Eternal Melody", in 1993.
The original song was only consisted of several Rock instruments : electric guitars, bass, drums, and Toshi's vocal - complemented by strings background to make it ballad and more emotional. However, the orchestration version was more complicated with many classical instrument sections played in the song. The new arrangement itself was quite different with the original arrangement. Those are what made me feel complicated in exploring this song and took longer time to complete it. The classical version included all basic classical instrument sections : Strings (included harp), wind, brass, and percussion sections. This arrangement i made was a modification of classical "Say Anything" recorded on "Eternal Melody" album and "Say Anything" that was performed on Yoshiki's Symphonic Concert in 2002, conducted by Konstantin Dmitrievich Krimets.
The song was begun by several string instruments' solo performances. And then oboe joined the melody, accompanied by strings. Gradually, the intro melody was dominated by strings, until the verse melody part where it was initiated by cello and wind instruments. Thereafter, the melody was mainly synergy of strings and winds. The brass sound did not come out until the chorus part. As the melody flowed, the emotion was mixed up. There were silent segments where only one / a few instruments dominating the melody in soft manner. There were also times were the music went elegant where all instrument played their parts in high dynamic. The original song was fully emotional. The lyric was full of sadness and hatred. Somehow, Yoshiki could conjure this fully emotional song into a full of elegance classical melody.
The multitude and completed instruments that played on the orchestra made me having difficulties in arranging the parts. As the parts contained of bars, notes, and also dynamic and tempo information for many instruments, i had to adjust the ideal placement so the visibility will be clear enough. Nonetheless, in some parts, some bars and clefs were found stacking up. I try as possible so it will not disrupt the visibility. Below are some messed up parts :
Well, basically i had no idea what to put on the video to accompany the song. So, i just put a collection of my favorite band, X Japan, pictures. If you found out odd images of X Japan (with such costumes), they were going non-mainstream by carrying Visual Kei style to Japanese music culture, which later was going popular and followed by other music groups. The pictures were compiling a story of X Japan journey, started from their early years in late 80s; How they made the journey in 90s and disbanded in 1998; The lost of one popular member, Hide; Reunited in 2007; And with the new formation, they made a new journey - World tour and spectacular stages. The successful world tour in 2011 had made the world called out for their second world tour, especially the unvisited countries. Even they had gone through several transformation, X Japan still remains in their fans' hearts, those from 80s era and those coming in later years until now.
X Japan Members (from their first major album until now) :
Toshi - Vocal
Taiji - Bass
Heath - Bass
Pata - Guitar
Hide - Guitar
Yoshiki - Drums and Piano
Sugizo - Guitar and Violin
And it turns out that today, one of the member is having his birthday.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY PATA !!
Say Anything Arranged for Orchestra-J :
And I thanked for everyone whose pictures I used on the video.
As mentioned before, this post is continuation from previous blog post about "Nodame Cantabile : Capo"
Beside the insistent comedy by the ridiculous characters, there were also other things that made Nodame Cantabile one of my favorite J-dorama. Earlier i had little knowledge about classical pieces but watching this series had broaden my insight of classical music. I also became more eager in exploring classical music field. A good thing included on the show, it was often when a piece was performed, there would be facts informed regarding the piece played (usually narrated by Chiaki's voice). Sometimes there were also other information regarding classical music or orchestra in some scenes (such as explanation about the difference between Basson and Faggot that had similar characteristics ). It gave more insights for the TV viewers. Furthermore, another positive thing of watching Nodame Cantabile, everytime i watched the episodes, seeing Chiaki conducting the Orchestra or Nodame playing the Piano, i was always got more motivated and pushed to do more. After the show, I usually got encouraged to continue composing or do Piano practicing.
There were many pieces performed on Nodame Cantabile. I could not remember all of the pieces but at least there were some internationally known pieces that i could memorize because following the series. Now i recognized and memorized the melodies of Beethoven's "Symphony no 7", Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue", Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto and Mozart's "Oboe Concerto KV 314", which i did not know at all before watching Nodame series. When watching Addie MS' Twilite Orchestra were performing repertoire from Nodame Cantabile series, i had been familiar with most of the pieces. Some pieces are obligated to be performed such as Beethoven's "Symphony no 7", Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue", and Sergei Prokifiev's "Montagues and Capulets". Those pieces are well known by the serial lovers.
I also found out the melodies i'd had ever heard on some events. Now i know that :
It was Rachmaninoff's "Piano Concerto No 2" that was played as background music on Yoshiki's drum solo performance on X Japan's concert.
It was Dvorak's "Symphony No 9 : From the New World" that i heard on "One Piece anime series
And i immediately recognized Ravel's "Bolero" was played at the beginning of Girls Generation's "Paparazzi" music video clip.
Regarding my interest in classical music, seeing some pieces were performed on the series, with its complicated and challenging playing, i got encouraged to try some compositions. The compositions such as Liszt's "Mazeppa", Mozart's "Turkish March", and Stravinsky's "Petrouchka" had got my interest to play it on piano. However, without a hard-enough practicing, one would not be able to play the pieces properly. I admit that i had done the practice much less then it should be. Hahaha.....
Every great mangaka (comic creator) i'd known usually study deeply about the theme they raised on their manga. Takeshi Maekawa has great understanding about chinese Kung Fu when creating "Kung Fu Boy" manga. Eichiro Oda has a wide insight about oceanic history so he can created a very famous and successful comic serial about pirates, "One Piece". So did Tomoko Ninomiya where she put many classical pieces that i had not even known yet on the manga. From many sources, i could not get the explanation whether Tomoko Ninomiya understands musical theory or classical music and able to play musical instruments but from a source, there is an information that she got helped by a person who inspired her to create the Noda Megumi character. Interesting fact mentioned is the inspiring person was also named Noda Megumi and she was a piano teacher in Fukuoka. (Both Noda Megumi (the real one and Ninomiya's) had the same name, same characteristics (The real Noda sent a picture of her messy room to Tomoko Ninomiya and drew Tomoko's attention), and also same hometown. The real Noda Megumi was also said as the one who composed "Moja-Moja Suite", Nodame's song creation on the story.
About the audience level rate, i could not decide the rate of the series because there were a few of mature contents but the joke was ridiculously hilarious and very comical. So, i made a conclusion that this live-action dorama might be aimed for adults who were still having a part of childish spirit (like me !). However, even the theme was generally about classical music, everyone could enjoy the dorama because the story was light and did not put many difficult musical terms.
I like watching Japanese Drama (J-Dorama), especially the comedy
ones. But the main reason i 'd prefer J-dorama to other countries' TV
series (Korean, Taiwanese, or western) is because they were only consist
of few episodes (mostly around 10-12 episodes). It was different with
Korean or Chinese TV series that mostly had over 20 episodes, or western
TV series that had continuous episodes aired in several seasons (or
Indonesian TV series that will not end as long as there are TV
audiences). I had watched many J-doramas and i can conclude that mainly
J-dorama contains dramatic scenes, comedy, and moral of the story.
One of my favorite J-dorama is "Nodame Cantabile"
. For classical music lovers or orchestra players must have been
familiar and should had watched this classical music theme TV series.
Even the popular Indonesian orchestra group, Twilite Orchestra conducted
by Addie MS, had ever held two concert with Nodame Cantabile theme.
There are many elements that this serial contains : Classical music,
comical comedies, orchestra, drama, lovers, etc.
"Nodame Cantabile"
originally was a manga created by Tomoko Ninomiya. This manga was then
developed into a "live-action drama" aired on Japanese Television.
Later, it was also developed into anime series. The most appreciation
come to the manga and the "live-action drama". Maybe one of its success
key is the theme as there are not many manga / TV serials come up with
classical music theme.
The
first time i heard about this series title, i did not recognize that
this was a classical music TV serial. But when i started to watch the
first episode and knowing that it was mainly about classical music, my
interest was about rapidly rising to follow up this dorama. I had to
admit that this series is one of the best J-dorama i had ever seen,
mostly because the classical theme contains and the stupid, ridiculous,
comical jokes that performed in the series.
Note
: I had to explain that the "Nodame Cantabile" i mostly talked about is
the "live-action" drama one. I did not read the manga, nor watching the
anime series. The real-human performers made the story depiction and
the characters' motion were more real and did not make sense
simultaneously(ignore it if you couldn't understand the meaning, haha...)
The
main characters are Shinichi Chiaki (Cast : Hiroshi Tamaki) and Noda
Megumi / Nodame (Cast : Ueno Juri). I appreciate both actor and actress
because they were successfully described the real characters of Chiaki
and Nodame, the hard-headed Chiaki and the clumsy Nodame where at the
end both of them established an interesting relationship. Another fact about the actor / actress is they had to learn about classical music and playing the piano so they would portray the characters properly. However, the instrument playing on the series / movies were performed by professional musicians, so did the orchestra performances.
Another
interesting part about their relationships is that they complemented
each other. Chiaki always yells, sometimes becomes rude, when Nodame's
spirit is low (also when Nodame did disgusting matters). Unwittingly, he was the one who was the most willing to teach / assist Nodame for becoming a better piano player (even at the end, he realized that Nodame had her own distinct view about piano playing). The other way around, Nodame was also becoming influential in
Chiaki's life. She tried to drive out Chiaki's aerophobia (afraid of
traveling by plane) to make Chiaki's dream of going to Europe come true.
She was also the first (and the most enthusiastic) one who pushed Chiaki in realizing his dream to become an orchestra conductor. Chiaki,
who formerly got annoyed by Nodame's existence, gradually admitted
her as one of important pieces of his life and then the love
relationship started to grow.
One of my favorite part of this dorama is the comical and ridiculous comedy (as it was adapted from a manga). Characters who are the most often doing stupid things are Nodame and Masumi (the timpani player), where they often fight because both were having special feelings for Chiaki (an exception from my interest to J-dorama is I always hate when there were 'yaoi' parts on the story ( you could browse the 'yaoi' meaning by yourself )). Those ridiculous moments such as Masumi's disgust expression every time Nodame flirts or seduces Chiaki and Masumi's embarrassment when Chiaki is nearby. He could suddenly become faint. It was also funny when Chiaki found out disgusting facts about Nodame and her room. Meanwhile, Nodame's most comical moments are the "Gyaboo..." expressions. Other characters who also sometimes become entertaining are Stresseman the conductor and Mine the violinist. All those characters become funny and did stupid things while they were on a drunk party. I often laugh when watching the "live-action" series.
Hufff... I feel that this post about Nodame had been long enough, whereas I still had some things to write about Nodame Cantabile on my draft.
So i had decided to split the post into two sections. This writing will be continued on "Nodame Cantabile : Coda".
I should have posted this
composition at the beginning of September 2012, but due to my health problem,
i’ve just had the chance to complete the song and put it on my blog at this
time.
Another composition originated by
Yoshiki Hayashi for X-Japan. The song “Longing” was launched on 1995. “Longing” was originally having two forms : one is “Longing – Setsubou no Yoru”, where there was only Toshi’s vocal with strings background
and the other one is “Longing –Togireta Melody-“, the one with more complete instruments such as
drums and electric guitar. You can listen to the songs in singles CD with the
same title.
This
time, i tried to make some improvements, rather than just studying and
imitating the song to examine my listening skill. This was also in order to
make it more compatible with classical instrumental orchestra, such as
disabling the drum part and replacing the electric guitar sections.
I made
the song begun with cello domination to make a it more deeply emotional. I want
to make an instrumental composition, so i filled the singer vocals part with
flute and clarinet, and for the chorus part, the vocal part was filled by
strings instruments. Piano also played an important part in this song, just
like the original composition, to accompany the flow. My favorite part is the
violin duet part in the middle of the song. This part was originally played by
electric guitars. Because the theme is orchestral, i tried to replace it with
violin duet and somehow i really love the result, even this part was only for
several seconds. Furthermore, the original “Longing -Togireta Melody-“ duration was
longer than the one on my composition but i cut some parts (another chorus
repetition) and it seemed more ideal with this shorter duration.
You may
wonder the the picture slides on the video was mostly fulfilled with loneliness
theme. As the song title spoke, and so did the melody, the mellow song was
generally about loneliness and sadness. That’s why i also tried to adjust the
orchestral melody with this theme so the song would not lose its original
picture.
The song 'Amethyst' was originally composed by Japanese Musician Yoshiki Hayashi for his legendary band, X-Japan. The song was regularly played as opening scene of every X-Japan concert. As the song flows, the X-Japan members will enter the stage one by one or in group. The classical nuance, combined with elegance, played important part in describing the magnificent concert.
The song was developed by multiple classical instruments. I arranged the 6-minutes composition with basic orchestral sections : Strings, woodwind, brass, and percussion. The base of this arrangement was taken from Amethyst piano scores by Yoshiki, combined with all that i caught from my hearing.
Begun calmly by several instruments, mainly by strings. The flow of the song filled with fluctuating mood. Some parts were filled only by a few instruments, while some others were build by many and various instruments.The final part was the climax where all sections had their roles. Overall, the flow was escalating and rose-up when reaching the ending.
The classical elegant nuance was describing something precious and elegant. It illustrated how Yoshiki associated X-Japan with the Amethyst gem. It is something i also want to present in this arrangement of mine.
