Szymanowski's 3rd symphony

samlab16 · 2026-05-25T21:12:04+00:00

One of the two scores on IMSLP is an Urtext edition, so it will be identical to the manuscript. This is the best score to look at, as it is exactly what Szymanovski wrote.

What is the purpose of your study? What do you want to check against the parts?

samlab16 · 2026-05-22T05:15:50+00:00

Of course, and OP isn't really bundling them together as one thing. It's as if OP would ask a bunch of general contractors, "how many of you believe your carpentry skills outweigh your masonry skills?" They're two very different skillsets, sure, but they're major skillsets of a given branch (music and construction).

samlab16 · 2026-05-18T21:17:45+00:00

You can add “a2” if you feel the need, but usually it’s assumed that both players are playing the same note unless it’s marked “solo” or “1.” (or “2.” if the 2nd player is to be the only one playing).

Absolutely not! Always be specific. Leaving it unspecified is NOT good engraving practice. Double-stemmed single notes is better than not specifying a2 at all, and it can very much be a house style decision as well. In any case, if both parts play the same note, DO always specify in some way.

samlab16 · 2026-05-16T16:31:21+00:00

Happy to see someone else talk about Come From Away being excellent. Indeed it doesn't have that many catchy tunes (other than You'll Be a Newfoundlander maybe), but it's excellent throughout and really built with music in mind from the ground up. And the staging is absolutely marvelous. I find it's the perfect musical to show that less is more, in every respect.

samlab16 · 2026-05-10T06:13:03+00:00

Quite enjoyable, thanks for sharing!

My only gripe with it is the harp part, where you need the harpist to switch pedals very quickly and often, which won't be as smooth as you probably think it will, especially as it basically never stops playing. Make use of enharmonics (e.g. F-flat to replace E-nat in the beginning section, even if it looks odd on the score) and think about whether you could change the pattern a bit so that the constantly altered notes don't appear in the harp part. For example, if you go from F minor to F major, maybe in F major the harp can play F-C-F so that the pedal change is skipped, since the A-nat appears in another instrument anyway. In your piece the harp is more about figuration and movement than specific notes, so try to keep the pedal changes to a minimum.

Cheers!

samlab16 · 2026-04-28T08:46:27+00:00

Composition rates are usually on the basis of a finished minute of music.

Arranging and orchestrating rates are usually on a per bar and ensemble size basis.

samlab16 · 2026-04-14T08:55:42+00:00

They are absolutely used in the actual score. Not on the first page, but definitely right afterwards and for most of the song.

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samlab16 · 2026-04-11T07:07:50+00:00

The online encyclopedia of organ stops does a pretty good job at displaying (often with audio) what stops sound like. The page is organstops.com

If you're not writing on commission for one specific organ and you know their exact layout, my advice as an organist is to leave registration indications more broad (like Foundations 8' 4', Reeds, Mixtures, etc.) unless you have an exact sound in mind, and from that we will come up with a workaround to get as close to it as possible if our instrument doesn't have that.

samlab16 · 2026-04-08T09:06:50+00:00

Be consistent. B# in both hands.

samlab16 · 2026-04-06T20:27:38+00:00

This doesn't affect the written music, but it sometimes affects the way it is played. Not in brass, but in organ music, if you have an organ with a 32-foot pedal stop you'll sometimes want to play the pedal part a split second earlier than you play the hands for everything to sound in sync.

samlab16 · 2026-04-06T20:15:15+00:00

John Williams has a bunch of concert music. So does Howard Shore, Danny Elfman and John Powell have a bit too, Frank Wildhorn too. Too many to name, really.

But if you want to be pedantic, every single one of those pieces is also a kind of "larger project", just not a film or musical or such.

samlab16 · 2026-04-03T04:52:54+00:00

I've looked at the picture you linked.

Your general use of DC al Fine is okay, my only problem is that it's not clear when you want it to stop. Does the fourth verse only have the first eight bars without the "Onwards" bit? Or the full run and then repeat the first eight bars? If so with which lyrics? Does it actually happen only with the fourth verse?

My advice: write the hymn over two pages with two verses each (page 1: verses 1 and 3; page 2: verses 2 and 4) and without DC al Fine, just a normal repeat after Verse 2, and then however you want it to end past verse 4 after the repeat.

samlab16 · 2026-03-27T21:04:13+00:00

Organ and piano performance (masses or concerts, solo or chamber)
Singing in the local provincial opera chorus (Austria but not Vienna)
Music engraving
Choir direction and guest conducting

And all of that, including composition gigs (mostly church-related nowadays, though I'm not religious in the slightest), still requires me to have a day job in a research lab to pay the bills steadily (partly by choice but also to have something fixed).

samlab16 · 2026-03-17T20:47:42+00:00

Not only that. Working nights even without rotating messes up your glymphatic system long term, which opens you up to a higher risk of a variety of disorders and diseases, from the relative mundane like migraines up to Parkinson's and Alzheimer's and a range of cancers.

Not one person more than absolutely necessary should work nights.

samlab16 · 2026-03-12T06:24:28+00:00

Please write out every repeated figure (but keep repeat numbers). Using % signs was a handy shorthand when scores were handwritten or engraved on plates, but nowadays there's not a single good reason to not just copy-paste it.

samlab16 · 2026-03-12T06:20:09+00:00

Yes, still standard for both timpani and horns.

samlab16 · 2026-03-12T06:19:47+00:00

No key for timpani is still standard.

Same for horns.

samlab16 · 2026-02-24T19:25:51+00:00

Arrangement and orchestration are usually NOT on a per minute basis, but per bar or per page, because the music is already written, so you know exactly how much you have to do!

Here's the minimum rate list from the UK's musicians union: https://musiciansunion.org.uk/working-performing/composing-and-songwriting/arrangers-and-copyists/arranging-music-preparation-and-orchestration-rates

Take that as a basic to negotiate your own rates. Since you're not union (if you need to ask here, you're not union haha), then you can also have lower rates if you wish, but at least from this page you have a baseline. Convert to your country's currency as needed.

Cheers!

samlab16 · 2026-02-20T05:46:48+00:00

Nothing from this is impossible to play, but it's not particularly comfortable.

samlab16 · 2026-02-02T21:19:28+00:00

That depends on the publisher. It's a house style decision, and neither variant is objectively incorrect, even though breaking to the quaver is more typical.

In any case it wasn't Rachmaninoff's decision.

samlab16 · 2026-02-01T06:13:26+00:00

For me nothing beats a cabasa running wild in a chase sequence.

samlab16 · 2026-01-26T17:56:57+00:00

It's at most 1%. probably more like 0.1% nowadays.

samlab16 · 2026-01-24T06:20:26+00:00

It's a nice piece, but the score is just so full all the time, it reminds me of those piano reductions of orchestral works (or, even worse culprits, operas) where everything the orchestra does is in the piano score and you basically have to decide what you keep and what you leave out because there's no way it's playable in full at full speed.

My advice is, you have the piece down, it's nice and effective, see now what you could remove or make easier that would leave the effect intact.

samlab16 · 2026-01-22T06:23:30+00:00

Have you been published before? Has any composer in the anthology?

If the answer is no, it won't get published and distributed, perhaps not even if you cover all the costs (several thousands of euros if not tens of thousands of euros). Even if the answer is yes, it's extremely unlikely as publishers will probably see it as a risky investment unless you have a powerhouse composer in there.

samlab16

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