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20th Century Orchestral Writing (Sunday 5 April 2026)
More than two years ago, I enrolled in the Pillars of Composition from Master the Score (see also my post from 26 December 2026). It took me quite a while to complete; not only because my time is limited, but also because I made a conscious effort to apply what I was learning in practice.
For instance, I incorporated orchestral elements into my song Brighter days, and in a collaboration with Daphne Reijnoudt, I arranged and recorded violin, viola, and cello parts in my home studio for her song Brighter days. The final piece I composed for the course remained untitled, but it can be heard on YouTube. It did not turn out quite as I had hoped, partly because I was simultaneously focused on technical work—specifically, setting up Dorico expression maps for the East West Hollywood Orchestra I had just acquired.
Despite that, I learned a great deal. In particular, I gained a solid understanding of sentence and period forms as fundamental 8-measure structures used to organize melody and harmony in both classical and popular music. A sentence (presentation + continuation) develops a basic idea and drives it toward a cadence, while a period (antecedent + consequent) balances two 4-measure phrases, concluding with a stronger cadence. In addition, the course provided valuable knowledge about writing themes, developing harmony and accompaniment, and applying counterpoint. There is still a long way to go, but I am making steady progress.
The video (poor sound quality; sorry) shows the piece. The SoundCloud clip has better audio.
My final orchestral composition that I did for the course Pillars of Composition. You can download the Dorico file below.
Orchestral Writing
I am continuing my journey with the course 20th Century Orchestral Writing from Master the Score. According to their advertisement, this course will elevate my orchestral compositions by learning advanced techniques like reharmonization and modulation, enabling me to craft longer, more captivating pieces. It will teach me to write stunning orchestral pieces in the style of your favorite Hollywood composers with constantly changing orchestral textures, and I will learn to compose in different orchestral styles like heroic, familial, adventurous, mystery, and much more. We will see…….
The course is provided by Mattia Chiappa who is a composer, orchestrator, musician based in London, UK. His expertise lies in the production of dense symphonic arrangements and rich orchestral scores that embody the spirit of classic film scores. Alongside being a composer, he is also a working musician, having performed as guitarist and bassist on many stages across the UK. Originally from Italy, Mattia moved to London in 2013 after winning a national competition with price a scholarship for the guitar performance course at University of West London. His lifelong interest for orchestral composition would lead him to transitioning into production music and seeing his work licensed for Netflix shows, BBC and Discovery documentaries among many other types of media.
Again, I will make use of different (orchestral) libraries including East West, Native Instruments Kontakt Ultimate, and Spitfire Audio BBCSO. However, in an attempt to optimize my workflow, I will be using Vienna Ensemble Pro 8. VEP can be used on a single computer as a central hosting environment for all my virtual instruments (e.g., East West, BBCSO, HALion, Kontakt), allowing both Dorico and Cubase to connect to the same instrument instances. Instead of each application loading its own sample libraries, they send MIDI data to VEP, which handles playback and returns audio making my workflow more efficient and consistent across notation and DAW environments. To enable communication, Bome Network is used to create virtual MIDI ports on the same machine. These ports act as bridges, allowing Dorico and Cubase to route MIDI into VEP as if they were separate systems on a network. This setup provides flexible routing, supports large templates, and avoids the limitations of standard virtual MIDI drivers, especially when many ports are required. I will explain this setup in more detail in a future post, but it is basically a modification from the workflow explained by Music Chef, who has provided a Dorico, Cubase, and VEP template, and Bome configuration file on this website (Toolkit).
Downloads
