Wanderer

WANDERER

This is my submission for the Broken Telephone Jam #4. You can download it through this site, or you can stream it via SoundCloud.

Wanderer is inspired by the beautiful artwork titled "At the tavern"  by the artist Dallas.

I tried to capture the same contrast between the frigid cold of a snowy night and the warm embrace of a friendly tavern.

Dallas' work made me imagine an adventurer wandering through the night, looking for temporary safety and asylum, before heading out in search of their next adventure.

In order to try to tell this short story through music, I tried to incorporate some word painting into the musical composition. Here's a breakdown of the word painting elements:

- First, let's state the obvious: The song is divided into three sections.
    - In section A, the adventurer wanders through the night looking for asylum.
    - In section B, the adventurer is in the tavern, restocking their supplies and getting ready to go back out into the wild.
    - In section C,  the adventurer goes back into the wild in search of their next adventure.

- Section A and C are in 4/4, while section B is in 3/4. The intent is to emphasize the contrast between the uneventfulness of wandering alone (Section A and C) and the eventfulness of an active tavern (Section B).

- Section A and C are very similar, however, there's a simple reharmonization on section C. We substitute the second instance of Gmaj7 from section A with a Bsus4, which is a variation of the chord Bsus2, which is used in the section B. The intention behind this is to convey that the adventurer has been impacted by their lived experience at the tavern, however short the experience was. The adventurer doesn't just take something "as is" from their experience in the tavern, they give it their own twist.

- Adding to the previous point, section C also contains a lute sound, which is directly related to the point above, however, it might also mean that a courageous bard has joined the adventurer in their journey. It's up to you to choose what you prefer.

- Lastly, both section B and C end in the chord C#7, which is a secondary dominant (III7) in the scale of A major. This types of chords create a strong sense of tension, which conveys that the story is not over.

I hope you enjoy this piece.

Thank you!