SKU: HL.14033404
ISBN 9788759874769. Danish.
The Wings Of Night for Trombone and String Quartet was composed by Bent Sorensen in 1998, as a commission from the Warsaw Autumn for Christian Lindberg and the Silesian String Quartet. Programme note: I do not yet know what to write about this short piece which I have just finished. But like my Piano Concerto LA NOTTE, it seems to take place at night-time - or perhaps it is only because I wrote the piece by night. In short, the title is from Shakespeare's 'Romeo and Juliet'.Juliet sings to the night - the night of love: 'Come, night, come Romeo, come, thou day in night, For thou wilt lie upon the wings of night, Whither than new snow upon a raven's back.THE WINGS OFNIGHT was composed as a commission from the Warsaw Autumn for Christian Lindberg and the Silesian String Quartet. (Bent Sorensen).
SKU: EC.8939
UPC: 600313489396.
Icarus works with his father to make wings to escape Crete. The wings are made of wax andfeathers. Icarus flies too close to the sun, the wings melt, and he falls. Although the storyhas a dark ending, the music centers on the excitement of building the wings and the dangerof flying. -Elena Ruehr.
SKU: HL.14023162
ISBN 9788759860960. Danish.
Nocturnal (1998-2001) for Trombone and String Quartet was composed by Bent Sorensen . Progamme note: The two movements of Nocturnal were written with a gab of three years. The last movement, which bears the title The Wings of Night, was commisioned by Warsaw Autumn in 1998, while the first movement - Mondnacht - was commisioned for Ultima Festival in Oslo in 2001. Despite the three years gab, these are not two separate pieces which have been linked together. The sketches for the first movement were begun immediately after the first performance of the second movement in Warsaw 1998. As the title suggests, there is a nocturnal atmosphere in the work. In the first movement weare perhaps in a park and notice the shadows of the clouds passing the bright moon. In the short second movement we are perhaps with Shakespeare's Juliet, calling for love, calling for the night: Come night, come Romeo, come, thou day in night, For thou wilt lie upon the wings of night Whither than snow upon a raven's back. ...perhaps we are elsewhere - at night! Nocturnal was written for Christian Lindberg and the Arditti Quartet and premiered in Oslo in 2001.
SKU: SU.28040230
The title of this work came from an acquaintance who used the phrase while discussing the importance of fully living the moments we are given. I. Where Was I? II. If Only For a Moment III. Soaring IV. Do Flies Have Wings? V. Dorian Flow Pieces of Time was composed for, and is dedicated to, violist Anne Black. She gave the first performance in August, 2022 in Eastport, Maine. Audio and score previews are available at: johnnewellmusic.com/works/instrumental-solo/ Viola Duration: 19' Composed: 2022 Published by: Abierto Music.
SKU: HL.49043938
ISBN 9790220133923. 9.25x12.0x0.494 inches.
The 3rd String Quartet was originally composed in 1982-3 to a commission from The Adelaide Festival, and premiered by The Petra Quartet in 1983. Subsequent to this quartet, I have composed two more; No. 4 in 1986 and No. 5 in 2002.The offer to re-publish this work, led me to begin by a process of amendment, but ended in the composition of a virtually new quartet! Only parts of the original quartet have been retained. I also chose to 'frame' (in my case this means an inspirational focus and filter), the quartet in a new way too.In Flight Music keeps the 4-movement format of the original quartet, but is now directly linked to a life-long interest in flight. The first two movements are concerned with aspects of humans in flight, whilst the last two deal with insects and birds respectively.Since all my music is these days preceded by visualisations in the form of drawings, wherever possible, this quartet might be performed with the four drawings, one for each movement, back-projected behind the players.Digital copies of these drawings may be obtained from Schott Music.Edward Cowie.Maurens. France. August, 2010.
SKU: HL.14020978
ISBN 9781844498802. 5.5x7.5x0.147 inches.
The second of the Quartets commissioned by the Naxos label was completed in January 2003. This work swings between nervous virtuosic energy to the serene calm of an extended Lento, with exotic harmonies reminiscent of Bartok, and is characterised by it's sharp and unpredictable contrasts. First performed by the Maggini Quartet on 11 July 2003 at the Pittville Pump Room, Cheltenham, as part of the Cheltenham International Festival. This is the score in a pocket-size format. The set of parts is available, catalogue number CH66594-01.
SKU: HL.48024494
ISBN 9783793140160. 9.0x12.0x0.067 inches.
Originally composed for clarinet quartet, this minimalist habanera swings between two chords in a melancholy way until a rather lively middle section is reminiscent of Astor Piazzolla's bitter-sweet harmony. On the CD Blue Silence (Vexations840 1202) the Acacia Quartet combined this piece with Silver Pearls (979-0-2025-3342-0), Silver Poetry (979-0-2025-3341-3) and Silver Eucalypt (979-0-2025-3331-4) to form Silver Suite. Whether played individually or as a four-movement group - this is a charming new repertoire for both professional and amateur ensembles!
SKU: FG.042-09103-6
ISBN 979-0-042-09103-6.
Eero Sipila was an organist by training. His liking for Gregorian chant left its mark on his compositions in the form of stylistic borrowings or at least reflections. In one of his letters Sipila mentioned as his main work the quartet that was to be the last thing he wrote. The name Lux aeterna is a reference to the section in the Gregorian mass, melodic motifs from which dominate the entire quartet. There is no trace of the modernistic tendencies of the works composed in the 1960s, but the pungent seconds harmonies characteristic of Sipila are all there.
SKU: SU.30145000
Based on the writings of Julian of Norwich Duration: 40' Composed: 2002 9x12 book, 40 pages Published by: Parsonage Press.
SKU: HL.14008374
ISBN 9781846096150. UPC: 884088435202. 8.25x11.75x0.105 inches.
The Full Score for Peter Maxwell Davies' fourth in a series of ten string quartets commissioned by the Naxos Recording company, first performed by the Maggini Quartet on 20th August 2004 at the Chapel of the Royal Palace, Oslo, Norway, as part of the Olso Chamber Music Festival. Composer Note: The fourth Naxos quartet was written in January and February of 2004, with the intention of producing something lighter and much less fierce than its predecessor, an unpremeditated and spontaneous reaction to the illegal invasion of Iraq. I returned to the well-known Brueghel picture of children's games (1560, now in Vienna), which had been the inspiration for my sixth Strathclyde Concerto, for flute and orchestra. These illustrations liberated my musical imagination, but I feel it would limit the listener's perception to be too specific about which game relates to exactly which section of the work. Suffice it to say that there is vigorous play - leap-frog, bind the devil with a cord, truss, wrestling - alongside quieter pastimes - masks, guess whom I shall choose, courting, odds and evens. The single movement juxtaposes these activities as abruptly and intimately as they occur in Brueghel. Rather as the eye is taken into different perspectives and proportions of scale within the picture, taking liberties which would never be present in, for instance, Brunelleschi architectural drawings, so here, with a constant sequence of transformation processes, I have distorted the neat, precise implications of modal progression, expressed in the unison opening phrase (from F to B through A sharp/B flat), so that the ear is led, en route, into the sound equivalents of strange passageways and closed rooms: sicut exposition ludus. As work on the quartet progressed I became aware that I was reading into, and behind the games, adult motives and implications, concerning aggression and war, with their consequences. It was impossible to escape into innocent childhood fantasy. The nature of the F to B progression underlying the whole construction derives from a passage in the development of the first movement of Mahler's Third Symphony, and the opening of Schoenberg's Second String Quartet. However, unlike in these models, here a real - if temporary - sense of resolution occurs at the close of the quartet: as when the curtain falls on the reconciled Count and Countess in 'Figaro' one wonders how long the F/B truce will hold, and games break out again. The quartet is dedicated to Giuseppe Rebecchini, Roman architect, and friend since the nineteen-fifties.
