Prelude no. 6 in E ~Major (Unrememberable Dreams)
This was the second project in my second semester of my composition class. The assignment was to write a short piano prelude in ABA form, specifically with the intention of blurring the transitions between sections to make them not obvious and to utilize as much extended harmony as possible. As such, this piece relies on quintal and quarrel harmony. I created the main theme using my girlfriend's name, Xinmu. I took the numerical place of each letter in her name and translated it to a set of mod 12 numbers which I then assigned to notes starting on E. As it turns out, most of the notes fall within E major.
I decided I would write a prelude for my set of preludes that I've been writing on and off. The piece is called "Unrememberable Dreams (Незапоминаемые сны)" as the piece evokes the sensation of waking up after a dream and having your recollection of it slowly fade. Here are the program notes:
Have you ever had a dream, but couldn’t quite recall it once you awoke? Сны незапоминаемые “Unrememberable Dreams” serves as an auditory representation of this sensation, with a coherent melody that gets mixed up, cut off, and fragmented throughout. Our sense of direction is muddied by harmony that doesn’t follow any specific direction, with fourths and fifths stacked on each other and jumbled up. By the end, the only memory that remains are the waking bells.