Symphonic Tales of The Silmarillion - Seventh Movement: Aulë, Smith of the Valar - Compositional Diary

At last the seventh movement of the Symphonic Tales of the Silmarillion cycle is ready! Portraying Aulë, creator of the land masses of Arda, father of the Dwarves. He was the divine master of crafts, smithing many things, among them the Chains of Melkor. Link

"As Aulë is a smith, he is the Vala most similar in thought and powers to Melkor, in that they each gloried in the fashioning of artful and original things. Both also came to create beings of their own. But while Aulë strove to be true to the original intent of the Music of the Ainur, and submitted all that he did to the will of Ilúvatar, Melkor wished to control and subvert all things, and was jealous of the creations of others so that he would try to twist or destroy all that they made. There was long strife between Aulë and Melkor both before and after the creation of Arda. Aulë, however, traditionally opposed attempts to fight Melkor, for fear of the damage that would be wrought to Arda.
When the Elves came to Valinor, the Ñoldor became the students of Aulë. Fëanor was his greatest pupil, and from him learned to make gems through craftsmanship that is now forgotten. This would eventually lead to the Silmarils, the greatest creation of handiwork within Arda. On the Flight of the Noldor, the Noldor who returned to Valinor under Finarfin named themselves the Aulendur, Followers of Aulë. Despite his lordly skill, Aulë is humble and compassionate, and indeed the Dwarves survived only because Aulë submitted them to the will of Ilúvatar. His spouse is Yavanna, with whom he dwells in central Valinor." -- http://lotr.wikia.com/wiki/Aul%C3%AB

The arrangement is heavily relying on choral parts, especially accented on the bass section of the choir, representing the dwarven folk who He created. 
It consists of two main characteristic parts: first one is depicting the more serious, epic nature of this divine figure. At start the choirs are going light accompanied by some wind and stringed instruments playing piano, then switching to a higher gear with the epic Godzilla hits and some quick string runs and brass progressions. 
The second part is giving a cheerful salutation to the archangel with quickly evolving melody in the forte part and slower choral parts, both in a graceful, light and positive context. 
Hope you'll enjoy it!

Symphonic Tales of The Silmarillion - Fifth and Sixth Movement: Elbereth & Melkor - Compositional Diary

The portraits continued! First released Elbereth, also known as Varda, wife of Manwë. Then just yesterday Melkor's portray got ready to be rolled out! Hope you will like them!

Elbereth, Queen of the Stars


Melkor, The Dark Lord

Symphonic Tales of The Silmarillion - Fourth Movement: Manwë, King Of The Valar - Compositional Diary

The fourth piece in the series is at last ready! 'Manwë, King Of The Valar'


The composition is parted into 3 important units. Starts out with a majestic minor scale chord progression and idea using choir and french horns as the main means for the melody. The strings are taking the chords on its back as it happens all through the piece. This part symbolizes the high ranked archangel's majestic nature. The music suddenly rolls into an agitated, action packed second part where the heavy staccato of the full strings ensemble is elevated by heavy brass melodies. Also a quickly rolling piccolo and solo violin staccato part is spicing up the inertia. After this part runs out, we get to the third one, the major scale theme of the Vala, where the ideas and chords is channeling the wise and positive nature of this archangel. It's rhythmical flow is helped by a synchronized, march like pattern of snare and different divisions of the orchestra. After this we get back to a repetition of the first part with new elements in the instrumentation, and then to a beefed upp and shuffled repetition of the second part, with an even heavier staccato of the string ensemble and heavier percussion entering. A final trailer like elevation of the harmonies gives the ending.

Hopefully you will enjoy the new piece, and find it appropriate to give the theme for this character of utter importance in the Tolkien universe.

Symphonic Tales of The Silmarillion - Third Movement: Ulmo, Lord of the Waters - Compositional Diary

Dear Fans and Friends,

I'm happy to report that after a longer period of silence, the third movement of the symphonic tales has been rolled out. The focus now has been shifted from the story telling of the Ainulindale to the portrayals of Valar derived from the Valaquenta of The Silmarillion.

The first in the portrayal series is the majestic, dreadful and all surround Lord of the Waters, Ulmo, the lonely divine figure of the mythology of Tolkien. Second in power to Manwe, most hated by Melkor, knowing of all news on Arda through all the waters flowing through and surrounding the landmass of the world.

"ULMO, Heru Rasa, or in English - Lord of the Seas, was second in power of the Valar only to Manwe. He was one of the nine Aratar, or those of chief power and reverence. He was a loner, the only one of the Valar to not have a wife (wife here is not in the common sense, but one who has similar interests and share deeds). He would never stay in one place for long, and took to resting anywhere he might be. He seldom came to the Councils of Mahanaxar, and only when in great need. He preferred to stay in Arda, not by walking on the land, as his form would fill man or elf with great dread. All waters were under his government; bays, rivers and even the waters under the earth. It is through these that he kept in touch with Arda, and thus knew more of the goings on with the children of Iluvatar than even Manwe."

The music is somewhat starting as an enervated and sad, musing part which shows the lonesome preference of this Vala, and also incorporates powerful and majestic parts which symbolizes his appearance before the mortal beings of Arda. The major part of the orchestral sections this time goes to the low and middle brass and also the contrabasoon and is accompanied by accentuated choral parts. Also touches some modern elements of compositional work with many less common harmonies and also random-like notes which depicts the watery, hard to glimpse nature of this divine figure. Strives for positive, uplifting images at times with some clearer, major chord resolutions, but also dwelling in strong, fast and agitated parts that outlines the unpredictable nature of the waters and the powers of this all-mighty Vala.

Symphonic Tales of The Silmarillion - Second Movement ready!

Happy to announce that the second title of the series is now finally available on SoundCloud for listening! :-)

Symphonic Tales of The Silmarillion - II. Let These Things Be Part 1 - Diary #1

Movement II is on the verge of completion! Hopefully recovering from a heavier flu soon... in my non-fever filled hours where I could get some time I polished the movement furher and further... 8 minutes and 32 seconds it seems...
Let me get to the parts:
1. Appearance of the Ainur. Singing and music of the ainur on the bid of Eru Ilúvatar, in unison they experience the power of the unity Eru Ilúvatar bestowed upon them - a rework of the so called theme FLAME IMPERISHABLE
2. Melkor's derailed entry, in the futile attempt of overpowering the theme of Eru Ilúvatar. Yet gaining his first fallen minions for his plans of being a Lord - MELKOR'S FULLY DISSONANT THEME - no masking of the discord yet
3. Eru's second theme for the Ainur, Melkor awaiting his second overpowering of the archangels singing and music, with even more rage after being told all his deeds still are originating back to Eru, the source of the Flame Imperishable and all that was created. - a new theme I call the EASTERN WESTERN THEME joining in both poles of the existence with the power of choir and oriental resembling violin technique.
4. Melkor's second attempt of overpowering the choir of Ainur. All Ainur stop singing in the end - MELKOR'S FULLY DISSONANT THEME
5. Eru Ilúvatar shows a new theme that is yet unknown to the thoughts and ears of all Ainur: the theme of the First Born and After-Born (Elves and Humans) - THE THEME OF THE CHILDREN OF ILÚVATAR, ample, sorrowful, yet profound and somehow uplifting. Not an easy work, I grant you :)
6. Melkor is giving a race for the dominance again, -
MELKOR'S FULLY DISSONANT THEME
7. Finally Eru Ilúvatar's rage and glory theme, silencing all with the mighties chord ever, uniting the highest and the lowest. - ERU'S RAGE AND THE MIGHTIEST CHORD

So these are the parts that I condensed into this 8 and a half minute. Hope you'll enjoy when I get there to publish. Possibly this week. :)

Symphonic Tales of The Silmarillion - Compositional Diary #2 - 'There was Eru, the One'

Heaven yeah, the first movement is ready :-) 'There was Eru, the One'


As I mentioned earlier it's titled 'There was Eru, the One'. I'll try to go into as much details about its composition as I remember.
First of all, I've started out with a pre-existing classical/electronica hybrid template I generally use for orchestral composition and production. It's, as always composed, mixed and processed in Cubase 7.5. I still use 7.5 tho I have 8.0 installed, but I have had some performance issues with my 80+ channel templates I created in 7.5.

Musically the first that was born was the piccolo flute's rhythmical staccato, keeping its C pitch constantly in the center of the composition. Of course there came the chord progression built around the staccato flute, built with full ensemble instruments of EWQL Hollywood Orchestra and Symphonic Orchestra. The drawn line of the piccolo staccato was kept floating without deciding between a major and a minor key, and thus connecting the two parts that slowly emerged from the harmonically constructed context of C major of the first part and the c minor of the second epic part. Yeah, I know, I keep it simple and low profile with the keys, but this kind of topic didn't either need chromatic variation or a really mixed bunch of transitions. I was keeping it simple and clean as I feel the topic of Eru Ilúvatar demands a pure vision on the material.

So slowly the two parts, major and minor were done, and also (forgot to mention), the heavy Loom additive synthesizers were already added to symbolize the Void, the Mechanical magic of the Tolkien universe that is yet to be born through the will of Eru and also through the mightiest Ainur Melkor who turned bitter and evil soon later. (Yet this deep mesmerizing synthesizer is just a signal of what is yet to come in the complex history of Arda, Earth).

So then I felt the need to present Eru to the listener, and (no surprise) I took the means of fanfare. A quite simple, harmonically very clean and also very simple rhythmical structure, to represent the purest form of omnipotence.

Then when it was done came the job to build up the C Major harmonic and melodic build up. Quickly it was set up on the strings and then varied with the addition of brasses at some parts, then usage of woodwinds later and also finally the all soothing harp was woven in. The crescendo part was the last to be polished for proper sounding and greater variation.

Next came the details of the c minor part, addition of heavy, epic string legatos, going down with majesty, and meanwhile the horns, trumpets and trombone strengthened to an epic melody to be kept along the way of the journey towards the culmination of the track. When this was done it was clear that the epic part needs to reach its full potential with a big tempo jump and addition of heavy percussion. The latter was again achieved with the fantastic SD2 Godzilla Hits... A periodically sliding higher drum in 5/4 against the thump of the 4/4 main drum and an almost snare like hit in a syncope pattern. This gave the whole part a heavy, and strong sense of movement and power. The strings now dominated the harmonic context with the stagnant slowly changing choirs. The trumpets playing the main melody quickly jump to the fantastic sounds of the EWQL Gipsy solo violin that lasts till the end. The full strings ensemble was then going into an ever grinding staccato replacing the piccolo in the role, giving a really tense background to the mostly slow, and sometimes quickly jumping solo melody. The interlocked semi final crescendo was using the elements of the opening fanfare part of the movement, and the final crescendo is a variation of that with a heavy thumping ever louder orchestral beat till the final staccato note.

The C Major part is called 'Eru, The One', while the epic ending is called 'The Flame Imperishable'.

A bit of mixing Equalizer setting here and there and setting up the Oxygene 6 for the pseudo master was the last step, before unleashing the first movement onto you! I hope you enjoy the first fruit as much as I enjoyed creating (and listening and listening and listening till all errs was quenched from the final version :)). Thanks for your attention! Now till I'm busy with planning the next movement listen and enjoy, share, spread the word, give me feedback, comment...whatever: be happy my friends!