Jonathan Shaw

     I only just came across this relic on my hard drive. This... *ahem*... intricate piece was the first piece of music I ever wrote using the software that would later become my compositional canvas - Sibelius. As deduced from the title, I did not complete the task with much maturity. The title of the filename is at least a little less embarrassing - "[Teacher's Name] Task 1" - as our teacher was introducing the software to us. This score bears my legal name as opposed to my pseudonym, which will crop up on future scores submitted as part of my educational assessments.

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     Taking a look at the music, Bach would be rolling in his grave (which I believe was one actual comment from my teacher - well deserved!). The choice of instruments was simple - I was playing the violin in a school ensemble at the time, so it was my most familiar instrument, likely resulting in the choice of instrumentation here. As for the material, it is built on a series of repetitions of the opening 4 bars, which are repeated twice with a small coda to finish.

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     I can't offer you any prizes if you said it was a terrible piece - it certainly is! - but I am willing to pay £1 towards your counselling fees if the parallel fifths were too much*.