Improv on Eternity Okay, here we go.
First of all, this is absolutely amazing! The pacing at the beginning is great, and I love the drama with that note at :14, and all the flairs of cool riffs that you managed to throw in here, like the tremolo at :28. Wait...that's it. I can't go any longer without getting something off my chest: HOLY F*CKING SH!T 65 MINUTES! Your passion for music is...inspiring! :O :D :O :D :O :D
Sorry. Continuing to review the piece now. I liked your method of drifting down the scale at 2:10. Believe me when I say I've seen a lot of people who think they can ride the scales like waves for 4 minutes (or sometimes 65) and somehow think it's interesting, but your chord progressions (like at 4:10) and such keep these otherwise simple intervals interesting. I really like the cute, yet jazzy and almost ominous vibe I was getting around 4:45 (I never would've combined those 3 adjectives before I discovered your music, believe me!). XD
I liked the texture and articulation you added at around 2:50 (and again at 3:25). Little things like that really help keep me engaged. Then there were those moments of simple haunting beauty, like around 5:45. I can't believe you improvised all of this, because it's just awe-inspiring to think that you could keep such intense focus and musicality for so long! I understand that you may have messed up at some points, but (as I believe I mentioned when I reviewed "Improv on Clarity") that it really adds a humanizing element when you do so.
7:43 had this awesome vibe like it was trying to be pompous and arrogant, but coming across as more cute than anything else, like a cat licking its paw indignantly after someone rudely splashed mud on it. I also love the dissonance around 9:13, and how that's then channeled into the brisk start-stop rhythms of 9:27. I think around 10:30 you were trying to incorporate some jazzy rhythms or something, and it kind of fell flat. It was a little hard to digest the rhythms, up until about 11:15, when it started getting better IMO. Still, maybe you should listen to/practice improvising some more jazzier tunes so you can improve your jazz-related skills. :)
At 11:55, I like what you were doing with using a theme to base your melodies around, yet between 12:10 and 12:25 or so, you tried a couple of pauses (I couldn't tell if these were intentional or not) and also sudden tempo changes that didn't really work for me. I really like the rhythms around 13:35, though. Also, nice job with the fast hands at 12:45. ;) I think that you might've needed a stronger theme to tie this piece together a little more, though. I know that's hard to do in a 65-minute piece, but maybe you should work up to it. You've done a fantastic 17-minute improv (on Clarity), so you could try to create a succinct one of 20 minutes, then 25, etc. Or maybe that's too ambitious...even for you! ^^
The piece is just going too fast for me to comment on everything I want to comment on! ARRGGHH!
I love the many various "breakdown" sections, though, such as that around 16:20. It's very tranquil there, and I think it offered a good change of pace for the piece as a whole. This, in turn, made the piece much more full-sounding and bright by contrast when it finally started picking up again. Interesting how you almost go in these cycles of structural patterns when you improvise. Considering what an incredibly long piece this is, it's rather smooth-flowing. The structure is a little bizarre, but of course it's hard to plan that when you have 65 minutes ahead of you. ;D
Like I said, I think one of my favorite things about this piece is the pacing. You slow it down and speed it up almost flawlessly. Your sense of how to transition between various sections of the piece are astounding, something I could never hope to mirror while improvising on the cello.
I was really interested to see where you went wit 20:20, as you had led up to that point with such an intense string of soaring arpeggios, and then 20:22 didn't make it quite as climactic as it otherwise may have been. Still, it's hard to criticize you for this as, well, the whole thing was improvised! Didn't your fingers hurt by the end of this?! I seldom practice my cello for more than an hour at a time, and even in that hour I'm not continuously playing.
Anyway, the part at around 22:50 also stood out to me, as you seemed to use more of the right side of the piano to an extreme extent, while also slowing down the tempo majestically, which led quite well into the dark-sounding dance-ish theme at 22:56. The chords around 24:00 seemed to combine so many different emotions - wonder, passion, innocence, etc. I don't even know how you manage to cascade up and down the scales so fast as at 24:50. 26:15 also had an interesting mood to it, and I liked the rhythms and flair that 26:26 had. That was one time where you really nailed the jazzy rhythms and such. Have you ever thought of taking some of these riffs and basing entire songs off of them? I'd say you have a year's worth of awesome song-writing ideas just in the first half of this piece!
I also really liked the chord progression around 27:10. 27:30 had an official sort of attitude to it, yet at the same time intimidating. Sort of reminds me of the Wicked Witch's guards in "Wizard of Oz." :D I love how every minute of this piece brings out some new theme or new emotion. I was done typing that last sentence, and then I listened closer and BOOM! Beautiful theme at 28:30, completely different that the "Y-oooohhhh-ohh"s of the Wicked Witch's guards. ;)
Right around the 30-minute mark, you started essentially modulating your chords to the same rhythm every 2 bars or so, but you quickly started doing something more interesting again at 30:15. I swear, I would've collapsed in exhaustion by now if this were me. Hell, I'm practically collapsing in exhaustion with the focus of listening to this for so long. Oh well, can't turn back now.
I like how you kind of reset yourself at 32:00 a bit. Really pretty section of the piece. I like the "inverted melody" style, where all the moving notes are in the lower octaves. I also like the dark tone that started to occur around 32:50. I like how you're leaving yourself plenty of space for transitioning and setting up the flow of the piece, and the reverb helps. The part at 33:30 was probably my favorite of the piece. It was just hauntingly beautiful. Then, I also liked how you started incorporating brighter and more upbeat elements back in at around 34:40. I also liked the theme around 35:35, which you kept until at least 36:00.
Unfortunately, this piece sometimes sounds like a series of short riffs you strung together, but somehow you still smooth out the transitions with all those tempo shifts and reverb automations. I thought 36:30 was a good "arrival point," though. ;) 38:00 also caught my attention because of the especially long pauses between notes there, and I'm glad it did catch my attention, as I found it quite pretty. I, once again, will applaud you for playing with the pacing so much in this piece. I think it really paid off.
I also like the dark, almost mechanical rhythm at around 39:05. It made me think of a day when ALE TAKES OVER THE WORLD, and all the rest of the people are working in his super-factory, turning huge wheels that help power various other machinery, like hamsters (except dirtier, scarred by whippings, and generally less cute). :D
I also liked the part at 40:26, which almost sounded like pop music, except then you came in with the minor chords to make it seem less pop-ish again. :)
41:40 had a bit of that mechanical rhythm vibe again, which isn't a bad thing, as it seemed purposeful, by which I mean it communicated a certain emotion to me by sounding rigid, as opposed to being played straight and without feeling.
Another one of the big crescendo-ritardando combos was at 42:45, and 43:05 subsequently felt very heavy. Then I liked how you quickly transitioned back into content that was lighter, yet still ominous, i.e. 43:20.
44:15 kind of reminded me of a montage in a movie, or perhaps a commercial for an anti-depressant. By 45:00, they're describing the medicine and how it has helped people, and at 45:45 the commercial ends (it's a long commercial, okay? Jeez...).
For the next couple of minutes after that, you engaged me in one of your epic breakdown sections for an epic piece again. ;D I was drawn to it by the intensely long pauses again, and then 47:30 seemed like another height of emotion. Excellent work with the rhythms around 48:00, and then the subsequent tremolos and rapid scales around 48:20, which continued well into the 49th minute. I admire the self-control it must've taken to be able to gradually decrease the volume and intensity on those tremolos so that you could flow into the following lyrical section with unimaginable ease. Well done there, my friend!
The part at around 50:48 also struck me as being quite beautiful, especially when you got to that high note at around 51:10 - it sounded like a bell! The following melodrama regarding the lowest couple of octaves was also quite well done at 51:30. I liked how your brought the tremolos back at around 52:45. I guess that's one theme you kept consistent throughout the entire piece. ;)
The part at 53:20 was, of course, beautiful. Nice work with the emotion there. 54:05 seemed like a big arrival point too, even though you essentially dragged out that transition from 53:50 for a long time to get there. XD I see this is the last main breakdown section before the "coda" of the improv, if you will, although I suppose it would be fitting if such a piece ended with a breakdown-like part.
I really liked the climax into around 55:45. 56:06 also had its own beauty to it. I feel like I had heard that melody/progression before 56:06, but a) I'm too lazy to go back and look for it and b) I've heard a lot of melodies and progressions over the last 56 minutes, so I'm probably just deluding myself. I loved those slides around 57:30, though. They added a lot of character to what would've been an otherwise rather bland section.
I think I was hoping for a quite, smooth ending to this piece the whole time, and these oddly specific dreams of mine started to become reality at 59:30. :D In fact, I think the last few minutes of this piece encapsulated my favorite larger section of the piece. It has an energy, yet the energy itself is almost strangely resentful. It's kind of like a young schoolboy, whose backpack weighs more than he does, rushing to class, as if hurrying to get there would make the class itself end sooner. It's infinitely admirable how you can keep up this amazing quality of musicianship to the very end of what must've been an extremely long recording session! :O
One thing I might suggest is that you make a piece like this (i.e., of this length) more coherent in the future. I know that it does have some structural (and maybe even melodic) repetition, yet as a casual, first-time listener, these repetitions are extremely hard to detect. Still, I applaud you for an insane accomplishment. Your ambitious projects are truly inspiring, Ale. I can only hope to have the motivation and passion for something one day that you have for music.
Anyway, about the ending: I loved the chords at 64:30. I thought it was funny that this piece looped, as if to say: "MWWAAHAHAHA! You've listened to it for an hour, now listen to it FOREVER!!!" Holy shit, maybe you HAVE taken over the world...
In all seriousness, I thought it was an appropriately conclusive ending, and it looped really well too. You sure showed @Phyrnna. XD Next stop: 2 hours! I would seriously be willing to review a piece that long, but not anytime soon. There's actually a lot I want to do between now and when I graduate high school in a few weeks. Still: you. Me. This summer. Piano improv. 2 hours. Let's go! ;D
In all seriousness, though, this is a huge accomplishment, Ale, and I'd like to congratulate you again. Now, I believe it's time for me to go. I literally have 2 characters left. :O
Up In Flames 
Facing the Stormy Sea 
Vega 
La Valse D'Amelie (Cover) 
-Late Night Call- 
Sabrepulse Horizons Remix 
Winterscape - MusicBoxx 
