Tag Archives: Hungarian Wedding Dance

Additional Pages, Harmony, Listening, Practice

Guitar Group Parts

Pupils! Pdf parts for Hungarian Wedding Dance have been uploaded to the Guitar Group Parts page. Use these in conjunction with the play-along midi files on the Guitar Group Midis page.

Repeated listening and playing along will help you overcome the two things which make this piece sound unusual:

  • the time signature of 7/8 – the beats are grouped 2 + 2 + 3

  • the unusual Lydian Dominant scale – 1, 2, 3, #4, 5, 6, b7

Rehearsal this Friday 31 Oct in St Mary’s PS, Haddington 13:30 – 15:30

Showcase Concert – Friday 27th March at 19:30 in Musselburgh Grammar School

 

Additional Pages, Concerts, Ensembles, Listening, mp3s, Practice, Uncategorized

Guitar Group Midis

Pupils! For your listening and dancing pleasure, midi files of Hungarian Wedding Dance have been uploaded to the Guitar Group Midis page.

This is the first of our East Lothian Guitar Ensemble pieces (next rehearsal – St. Mary’s PS, Haddington, 1:30 – 3:30)

The date for the Showcase Concert is Friday 27th March 2009 – the performance will take place in Musselburgh Grammar School – tickets will go on sale 4 weeks before the concert – in the Brunton Hall Box Office – this ensures equal access regardless of which school you attend.

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Experiment

I conducted a short experiment over the last couple of days, concerning who gets what part in the first of our East Lothian Guitar Ensemble arrangements. The piece is in three parts – top, middle and bass. I’ve also created four heterophonic parts so you could say the structure of parts is:

1, 1a, 2, 2a, 3, 3a, 3b

Using Sibelius, I played the score to the pupils at performance speed – which is pretty brisk . In addition to the speed there are two other unusual factors:

  • there are 7 beats per bar – grouped as follows 12 12 123

  • it is based on a very unusual scale (E Lydian Dominant) – resulting in unusual harmonies – one effect of which can be to make the less confident pupil occasionally doubt that they have landed on the correct note

Before the music began pupils were asked to identify which parts would meet the following criteria for them:

  • the part would (eventually*) be manageable

  • it would provide some element of challenge and interest

  • it might appeal to their natural strengths e.g. by being essentially melodic, harmonic or rhythmic in nature

  • it would avoid any feeling of distress

Somewhat to my surprise, every group and individual chose as I would have predicted. This could mean one (or possibly more) of three things:

  • that pupils are aware of their current levels

  • that they are aware of the likely speed of progress over the remaining months (even although some have not yet played in the East Lothian group)

  • that I am unconscious of Derren Brown-style levels of manipulation

Over the holiday, I hope to upload not only play-along midi files but parts of the piece so, if you play the guitar, you could simulate the experiment. For this particular piece, Hungarian Wedding Dance, most of the parts will be in TAB as opposed to traditional notation. This is due to the fact that many of the notes have been relocated onto strings other than the one where they would normally be found. This is done for two reasons:

  • increased resonance e.g. using 2nd string E at fret 5 instead of open E on string 1 – the sound of which is a little thinner

  • the note is more easily reached from the previous note than it would be in its normal location

* eventually, in this case, is the Showcase Concert on Friday 27 March at 7:30 in Musselburgh Grammar School