SKU: ST.W187
ISBN 9790220203305.
Anthony Caesar finds a moving text by the teenage Etonian, Oxford Movement influenced, Digby Mackworth Dolben (1848-1867), who died tragically young while swimming. Canon Caesar's anthem is a classic example of the Franciscan principle (observed by lamentably few composers) of true beauty springing from simplicity. The text inspires a sort of post-Howells harmonic idiom, though with the choir's part kept remarkably simple. The most inspired moment comes when the opening progression, which sets the poignant tension of the first three verses, is subtly transformed into radiant certainty in the last verse: I asked for Thee- / And Thou didst come / To take me home / Within Thy Heart to be. Although the parts divide at times, this miniature classic is not too difficult for any well rehearsed four-part choir.
SKU: BA.BA07417
ISBN 9790006561469. 27 x 19 cm inches. Text Language: Swedish, English. Preface: Jansson, MÃ¥rten.
“I asked my friend, the poet Einar Askestad, if he could write a poem for me about love between father and son, brothers and God.I felt that these forms of love are seldom sung about. The poem moved me greatly and I have tried to put music to these words which is simple yet full of beauty. In the four movements of this suite-like piece, various aspects of these relationships are conveyed.†(Marten Jansson)“My music is my own and I have never tried to be original. That has always been my motto and I have only tried to use music to express all the feelings which life has to offer. This has led people to describe my music as ‘so sad that it sounds like birds who have lost their wings‘ but also as ‘the happiest classical music that we have ever heard’.My compositions are almost all sacred. They express not only my own faith but also my appreciation and respect for the timeless texts that have been used for centuries and centuries.â€MÃ¥rten Jansson (b. 1965), elected member of the Föreningen svenska tonsättare (the Society of Swedish Composers), graduated from the Royal College of Music, Stockholm (KHM) with an MFA degree in Music Education, Dalcroze Eurhythmics and Voice. For more than ten years he was the music director and conductor of “Carmenâ€, one of the most prominent womens’ vocal ensembles in Sweden. He currently teaches choral conducting and music theory as well as giving vocal tuition at the Bolandgymnasiet and Musikskolan in his home town of Uppsala.
SKU: HL.14030676
ISBN 9788759863879. Danish.
The 'Ten short piano pieces' with the title Sommerferie i Blekinge (Summer Holiday in Blekinge) (1916) have not been preserved in their complete form. The only existing source is a manuscript in Rued Langgaard's hand that lacks the first and last pages with sections of the music. This means that the entire first piano piece with the title Paa rejse (Travelling) is missing as well as most of Piece II, Mode (Meeting) (only the conclusion of this piece has been preserved). A large fragment exists of Piece X, Aften med Dans (Evening with Dancing), but the conclusion is missing. The manuscript is to be found at the Royal Danish Library in Copenhagen (RLS 83,2). On the first page,Langgaard has merely written 'Piano Pieces 1916': the real title and titles of the movements in the first two pieces derives from other sources. In 2008, the Rued Langgaard Society asked the Danish composer Niels Marthinsen (b. 1963) to add to the work, the aim being to create a 'performance version'. Marthinsen composed a complete new first piece - Paa rejse (Travelling) - and allowed it to merge with the preserved concluding fragment of Langgaard's second piece, Mode (Meeting). Niels Marthinsen further composed a conclusion to the incomplete Piece X, Aften med Dans (Evening with Dancing), and in it incorporated a reference to the first piece, so that his additions came to form a frame round what hasbeen preserved of Langgaard's work. This supplemented version was given its first performance by Berit Johansen Tange in 2008. The overall title and titles of the individual pieces refer to a summer stay in 1913, i.e. three years before the work was composed, when the then 20-year-old composed was on holiday in Kyrkhult in Blekinge (Sweden).
SKU: CF.CAS117
ISBN 9781491153291. UPC: 680160910793. 9 x 12 inches. Key: A major.
Abendstern, composed by Lauren Bernofsky,?evokes an image of a sunset over the tree-covered hills of the Bavarian countryside with the Abendstern, or evening star, shining brightly over the scene. A hauntingly beautiful theme in falling thirds?evokes the treetops as they become darker and murkier. This piece is a wonderful addition to any concert program and can be used as a touching?tribute at a memorial service.One summer night during a visit to Bavaria in southern Germany, I stood outside on a balcony overlooking the hills of the Bavarian forest, watching the beautiful early-evening sky. It was still light out, but I could make out one solitary star in the sky. As the sun slowly went down, the landscape became more and more dark and indistinct, and the star shone brighter and brighter. My mother-in-law stood there with me. I asked her the name of the star, and she answered, Abendstern (or Evening Star.) I was so moved by what I saw, I went inside and took out my manuscript paper and started to write down this piece. The tree-covered hills and tranquility of the evening are evoked by the theme, whose contour (with little bumps) mirrors the contour of the treetops on the hills. The star is represented by the sustained note E; at the beginning of the piece, it can be heard in a low register in the violas, and over the course of the piece, it is heard in higher and higher octaves, as the star shines ever more brightly. By the end, the landscape has disappeared into the darkness, and now all we see is the star, shining its brightest, and played by the upper strings, now harmonized to convey its brilliant light..One summer night during a visit to Bavaria in southern Germany, I stood outside on a balcony overlooking the hills of the Bavarian forest, watching the beautiful early-evening sky. It was still light out, but I could make out one solitary star in the sky. As the sun slowly went down, the landscape became more and more dark and indistinct, and the star shone brighter and brighter. My mother-in-law stood there with me. I asked her the name of the star, and she answered, Abendstern (or Evening Star.) I was so moved by what I saw, I went inside and took out my manuscript paper and started to write down this piece. The tree-covered hills and tranquility of the evening are evoked by the theme, whose contour (with little bumps) mirrors the contour of the treetops on the hills. The star is represented by the sustained note E; at the beginning of the piece, it can be heard in a low register in the violas, and over the course of the piece, it is heard in higher and higher octaves, as the star shines ever more brightly. By the end, the landscape has disappeared into the darkness, and now all we see is the star, shining its brightest, and played by the upper strings, now harmonized to convey its brilliant light..One summer night during a visit to Bavaria in southern Germany, I stood outside on a balcony overlooking the hills of the Bavarian forest, watching the beautiful early-evening sky. It was still light out, but I could make out one solitary star in the sky. As the sun slowly went down, the landscape became more and more dark and indistinct, and the star shone brighter and brighter. My mother-in-law stood there with me. I asked her the name of the star, and she answered, Abendstern (or Evening Star.) I was so moved by what I saw, I went inside and took out my manuscript paper and started to write down this piece. The tree-covered hills and tranquility of the evening are evoked by the theme, whose contour (with little bumps) mirrors the contour of the treetops on the hills. The star is represented by the sustained note E; at the beginning of the piece, it can be heard in a low register in the violas, and over the course of the piece, it is heard in higher and higher octaves, as the star shines ever more brightly. By the end, the landscape has disappeared into the darkness, and now all we see is the star, shining its brightest, and played by the upper strings, now harmonized to convey its brilliant light.
About Carl Fischer Concert String Orchestra Series
This series of pieces (Grade 3 and higher) is designed for advancing ensembles. The pieces in this series are characterized by:
SKU: CF.CAS117F
ISBN 9781491153307. UPC: 680160910809. 9 x 12 inches.
SKU: CF.CPS225
ISBN 9781491152515. UPC: 680160910014.
Tartan Tapestries is an original piece that sets out to emulate Scottish folk music. Composer Larry Clark has created a concert overture in triple meter to capture the essence of music from Scotland. After a lilting first section, lush and beautiful moments weave a tapestry of sounds with the lyrical, middle section of the piece. There is an optional part for bagpipes, and an optional ending should you chose to use this instrument as part of the piece. Alert your contest music committee about this strong new piece for advancing groups.Tartan Tapestries was commissioned by Friends of the Arts for the Saint Andrew's School Band in Boca Raton, Florida. The band program at Saint Andrew’s School is under the direction of Andrea Wolgin. The premiere took place on November 29, 2017.When I was asked by their conductor Ms. Wolgin to write a piece for the Saint Andrew’s School, I asked her what kind of involvement she wanted the students to have in the process. We discussed several options for having the students involved in the process of creating with the type of piece they wanted. We set up a “Skype†meeting with members of the band to discuss the piece. During this discussion, the consensus of the students was that they wanted a piece depicting the Scottish influence to the school. They also wanted a piece that would challenge all sections of the band and to include bagpipes if possible. I asked that the students be involved in helping to name the piece once it was completed, for which they agreed and were very helpful. Armed with this information, I set out to compose a piece for them, and Tartan Tapestries is the result.The piece begins with a fanfare gesture based upon rhythms and harmonies that appear throughout the piece. I chose the lilting triple feel to the piece, to bring about the Scottish flavor. I wanted the fanfare to be bardic sounding, to depict the strength of the Scottish people and for the piece to have a dynamic opening. The fanfare contains material that alludes to the main theme and with a bit of dissonance and tension that is resolved in the main body of the piece.The main theme is a lilting original melody, but one that I hope with have the essence of Scottish folk songs. The main idea is followed by a more modal and dark sounding secondary theme, first stated in the horns. This material is later used in the development section of the piece. The main theme returns several times, with different and varied orchestrations and harmonic treatments. This is followed by a short transition leading to the more lyrical and slower second section of the piece. A transparent presentation of the lyrical theme, which is based on aspects of the main theme, is presented first by a solo flute. This section is a nod to famous composer Malcom Arnold’s wonderful works for orchestra in its style and orchestration. After a transition or bridge section with a solo euphonium, the piece builds to a dramatic climax of the lyrical theme by the full band. This subsides to a return of the solo flute to end this second section of the piece, followed by a transition back the main theme.The solo bagpipes play a central role in the return of the main theme and take center stage after being heard in the distance earlier in the work. The piece brings back a shortened version of the darker secondary theme, followed by a hint of the fanfare material that builds to one last statement of the main theme by the full band, before leading to a dramatic coda to complete the work.It has been my pleasure to have been given the opportunity to compose this piece for the Saint Andrew’s School Band! I thank Andrea Wolgin for making it happen, and I hope that you enjoy it as much as I have enjoyed bringing the piece to life.–Larry ClarkLakeland, Florida 2017.
SKU: CF.CPS225F
ISBN 9781491153192. UPC: 680160910694.
SKU: CF.CM9795
ISBN 9781491164662. UPC: 680160923571. Key: A major. English. Coty Raven Morris. Original.
The text for When I Grow Up first came to me while I was teaching in Houston, Texas. I noticed that my students were becoming more and more concerned about what steps they had to take as students to secure a future for themselves decades ahead. Young people are finding themselves having to make lifelong decisions at a time where they are still in a season of exploration and wonderment. I then asked myself, What happened to discovery through play and imagination?With the help of one of my former and forever choir students, Monica Juarez, we took my original text and created illustrations of a young Coty in New Orleans, Louisiana imagining, in real time, all of the things that she could be! It was important to me that the images were of real things that I had seen growing up every day.That we are limitless and that it's only in the pressures of growing up that we can lose our creativity, I hope this text allows both singers and conductor to let their imagination take the lead and shape the journey ahead!Sing with JOY!—Coty Occasionally, when I get to visit with young people, I’ll ask, Has anyone ever asked you want to be when you grow up? All the hands go up. Children say yes, and then proceed to tell me what they want to be when they grow up. So, then I ask a follow-up question, Why on earth do you have to wait until you’re a grown-up to be somebody?!When I first read through Coty’s text, I was so moved by how clear and beautiful that message of empowerment shines through:I want to live, and that begins now. I want to be happy. And I refuse to wait until I grow up.I also was struck by her imaginative use of the four classical elements—air, water, fire, and earth—to bring us on a journey of discovery and wonder.I’ve tried my best to, not so much set Coty’s words to a tune, as to go along with her on the journey and see what music would emerge. And I’m so happy you’ve joined us on the journey, too.Welcome!—Mark.
SKU: CF.CM9794
ISBN 9781491164655. UPC: 680160923564. Key: A major. English. Coty Raven Morris. Original.
The text for When I Grow Up first came to me while I was teaching in Houston, Texas. I noticed that my students were becoming more and more concerned about what steps they had to take as students to secure a future for themselves decades ahead. Young people are finding themselves having to make lifelong decisions at a time where they are still in a season of exploration and wonderment. I then asked myself, What happened to discovery through play and imagination?With the help of one of my former and forever choir students, Monica Juarez, we took my original text and created illustrations of a young Coty in New Orleans, Louisiana imagining, in real time, all of the things that she could be! It was important to me that the images were of real things that I had seen growing up every day.That we are limitless and that it's only in the pressures of growing up that we can lose our creativity, I hope this text allows both singers and conductor to let their imagination take the lead and shape the journey ahead!Sing with JOY!—CotyOccasionally, when I get to visit with young people, I’ll ask, Has anyone ever asked you want to be when you grow up? All the hands go up. Children say yes, and then proceed to tell me what they want to be when they grow up. So, then I ask a follow-up question, Why on earth do you have to wait until you’re a grown-up to be somebody?!When I first read through Coty’s text, I was so moved by how clear and beautiful that message of empowerment shines through:I want to live, and that begins now. I want to be happy. And I refuse to wait until I grow up. I also was struck by her imaginative use of the four classical elements—air, water, fire, and earth—to bring us on a journey of discovery and wonder.I’ve tried my best to, not so much set Coty’s words to a tune, as to go along with her on the journey and see what music would emerge. And I’m so happy you’ve joined us on the journey, too.Welcome!—Mark.
SKU: PR.165001000
ISBN 9781491129241. UPC: 680160669776. 9 x 12 inches.
Commissioned for a consortium of high school and college bands in the north Dallas region, FOR THEMYSTIC HARMONY is a 10-minute inspirational work in homage to Norwood and Elizabeth Dixon,patrons of the Fort Worth Symphony and the Van Cliburn Competition. Welcher draws melodic flavorfrom five American hymns, spirituals, and folk tunes of the 19th century. The last of these sources toappear is the hymn tune For the Beauty of the Earth, whose third stanza is the quatrain: “For the joy of earand eye, For the heart and mind’s delight, For the mystic harmony, Linking sense to sound and sight,â€giving rise to the work’s title.This work, commissioned for a consortium of high school bands in the north Dallas area, is my fifteenth maturework for wind ensemble (not counting transcriptions). When I asked Todd Dixon, the band director whospearheaded this project, what kind of a work he most wanted, he first said “something that’s basically slow,†butwanted to leave the details to me. During a long subsequent conversation, he mentioned that his grandparents,Norwood and Elizabeth Dixon, were prime supporters of the Fort Worth Symphony, going so far as to purchase anumber of high quality instruments for that orchestra. This intrigued me, so I asked more about his grandparentsand was provided an 80-page biographical sketch. Reading that article, including a long section about theirdevotion to supporting a young man through the rigors of the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition fora number of years, moved me very much. Norwood and Elizabeth Dixon weren’t just supporters of the arts; theywere passionate lovers of music and musicians. I determined to make this work a testament to that love, and tothe religious faith that sustained them both. The idea of using extant hymns was also suggested by Todd Dixon,and this 10-minute work is the result.I have employed existing melodies in several works, delving into certain kinds of religious music more than a fewtimes. In seeking new sounds, new ways of harmonizing old tunes, and the contrapuntal overlaying of one tunewith another, I was able to make works like ZION (using 19th-century Revivalist hymns) and LABORING SONGS(using Shaker melodies) reflect the spirit of the composers who created these melodies, without sounding likepastiches or medleys. I determined to do the same with this new work, with the added problem of employingmelodies that were more familiar. I chose five tunes from the 19th century: hymns, spirituals, and folk-tunes.Some of these are known by differing titles, but they all appear in hymnals of various Christian denominations(with various titles and texts). My idea was to employ the tunes without altering their notes, instead using aconstantly modulating sense of harmony — sometimes leading to polytonal harmonizations of what are normallysimple four-chord hymns.The work begins and ends with a repeated chime on the note C: a reminder of steeples, white clapboard churchesin the country, and small church organs. Beginning with a Mixolydian folk tune of Caribbean origin presentedtwice with layered entrances, the work starts with a feeling of mystery and gentle sorrow. It proceeds, after along transition, into a second hymn that is sometimes connected to the sea (hence the sensation of water andwaves throughout it). This tune, by John B. Dykes (1823-1876), is a bit more chromatic and “shifty†than mosthymn-tunes, so I chose to play with the constant sensation of modulation even more than the original does. Atthe climax, the familiar spiritual “Were you there?†takes over, with a double-time polytonal feeling propelling itforward at “Sometimes it causes me to tremble.â€Trumpets in counterpoint raise the temperature, and the tempo as well, leading the music into a third tune (ofunknown provenance, though it appears with different texts in various hymnals) that is presented in a sprightlymanner. Bassoons introduce the melody, but it is quickly taken up by other instruments over three “verses,â€constantly growing in orchestration and volume. A mysterious second tune, unrelated to this one, interrupts it inall three verses, sending the melody into unknown regions.The final melody is “For the Beauty of the Earth.†This tune by Conrad Kocher (1786-1872) is commonly sung atThanksgiving — the perfect choice to end this work celebrating two people known for their generosity.Keeping the sense of constant modulation that has been present throughout, I chose to present this hymn in threegrowing verses, but with a twist: every four bars, the “key†of the hymn seems to shift — until the “Lord of all, toThee we praise†melody bursts out in a surprising compound meter. This, as it turns out, was the “mystery tuneâ€heard earlier in the piece. After an Ivesian, almost polytonal climax, the Coda begins over a long B( pedal. At first,it seems to be a restatement of the first two phrases of “For the Beauty†with long spaces between them, but it soonchanges to a series of “Amen†cadences, widely separated by range and color. These, too, do not conform to anykey, but instead overlay each other in ways that are unpredictable but strangely comforting.The third verse of “For the Beauty of the Earth†contains this quatrain:“For the joy of ear and eye, –For the heart and mind’s delightFor the mystic harmonyLinking sense to sound and sightâ€and it was from this poetry that I drew the title for the present work. It is my hope that audiences and performerswill find within it a sense of grace: more than a little familiar, but also quite new and unexpected.
SKU: PR.16500100F
ISBN 9781491114421. UPC: 680160669783. 9 x 12 inches.
SKU: CF.CM9785
ISBN 9781491164563. UPC: 680160923472. Key: E major. English. Psalm 121:1-8.
The opportunity to compose this piece came to me during my second year as a composition student at Texas Christian University. A family from Big Spring, a small town in West Texas, reached out to one of my high school choir directors, Ms. Kathryn Zetterstrom, and asked if she knew any composers for a project. Thankfully, she sent them my information.The project was created specifically to celebrate the 80th birthday of Jobeth Corwin, the family's matriarch. For the text, the family asked me to set her favorite psalm and a psalm loved by many: Psalm 121. Jobeth Corwin was a lifelong chorister who sang the alto part in any choir she was a member of, so to start the piece, I began with a solo intended for an alto voice. While this is my preference, the solo can be sung by any treble voice.I sincerely hope you enjoy this piece and it brings joy to all who hear and sing it!
SKU: PR.114419810
ISBN 9781491136638. UPC: 680160681921.
Stacy Garrop’s ROAD WARRIOR is music of real-life tragedy, expressed through the power of a trumpet/organ duo. Drawing inspiration from Neil Peart’s autobiographical book, “Ghost Rider: Travels on the Healing Road,†Garrop’s work grieves the loss of a friend’s young son and the journey to healing. ROAD WARRIOR’s evocative movement titles are drawn from passages in Peart’s book:1. I Am the Ghost Rider2. My Little Baby Soul3. Are You With Me Here?.When Clarion members Keith Benjamin (trumpet), Melody Steed (organ), and I initially discussed possible topics for a new piece, Keith brought up his son Cameron, who had passed away at the age of seven from leukemia. While Cameron’s life ended too soon, he left an indelible and lasting mark on his those surrounding him. Keith asked if I could commemorate Cameron musically.In talking over possible ways to do this, Keith mentioned the book Ghost Rider: Travels on the Healing Road. The book was written by Neil Peart, who is well-known as the longtime drummer and lyricist of the band Rush. Peart suffered the heartbreaking loss of his daughter in 1997, followed by his wife 10 months later. In an effort to work through the grieving process, Peart did what his wife suggested before she passed: he got onto his motorcycle and hit the open road. Ghost Rider chronicles a year of Peart’s life in which he drove for 55,000 miles, zigzagging his way across Canada, the western portion of the United States, Mexico, and Belize. Peart’s powerful story illustrates how he coped with immense loss and eventually emerged on the other side to once again embrace life. Keith had found Peart’s book helpful in dealing with Cameron’s death; moreover, Mr. Peart sent Cameron a signed cymbal while he was in the hospital undergoing treatment. This unexpected gesture of compassion and generosity meant the world to both Cameron and Keith.I chose three phrases from Peart’s book to serve as the inspiration for the movements in Road Warrior. In the first movement, I am the ghost rider, I imagined the performers to be howling phantoms that are haunting drivers on a nearly deserted highway. Peart often mentioned that he felt haunted by ghosts from the past while on his journey, and sometimes felt like a ghost himself, moving through an immaterial world as he rode from town to town. The second movement, My little baby soul, references Peart’s wording to define his own inner essence that he was trying to protect and nurture while on his journey. In this gentle movement, I capture the innocence and simplicity of a newborn soul. The piece concludes with Are you with me here? In this movement, I depict the performers as they search to find connections to those they have lost, and to those still living.Over the course of his travels, Peart kept up a steady letter correspondence with his close friend Brutus. In one of his first letters, he repeatedly asks Brutus if he is with him in spirit. I found it to be very poignant that while in his self-imposed exile, Peart discovered that he still needed connections to humanity.I wish to thank Mr. Peart for granting me permission to use his phrases as the movement titles, and for serving as the inspiration for Road Warrior. Rarely do any of us make it through our lives without being touched by the loss of someone dear to us. I found Peart’s insights into his grieving and recovery process to be insightful, eloquent, and surprisingly comforting. His journey is a touching reminder that with enough fortitude and time, we can work through what fate deals us and continue down our own road of life.
SKU: HL.49047362
ISBN 9798350124842. UPC: 196288207597.
The choice of 16th century texts, by Bronzino and Battiferri, reflects the interests of the dedicatee of these sonnets - Craig Hugh Smyth, a fine art historian and former director of the Villa I Tatti, who was a specialist in Bronzino and Pontormo. Bronzino's sonnet is a lament on the death of Pontormo, his teacher; Laura Battiferri's poem is a direct response to that of Bronzino. As I was also asked to set sonnets by Petrarca, I chose two of his closely linked sonnets, numbers 229 and 230 in the Rime Sparse. I had written a work for I Tatti some five years earlier setting Petrarca (â??A qualunque animaleâ?, the first in my Fourth Book of Madrigals) and was familiar with the context. However, through correspondence with Kathryn Bosi, Music Librarian at I Tatti and, through her, Craig Smyth's family, I became increasingly aware of his unusual and quite special character. From his undergraduate days at Princeton and indeed throughout his life, although a great scholar and writer, he was at the same time an aficionado of jazz, loving above all Louis Armstrong, being photographed with Duke Ellington, taking his children to see Thelonious Monk, listening to Ben Webster and playing the tenor saxophone himself. Indeed, he had told Kathryn Bosi that he had been proud to walk in procession at the funerals of black musicians in New Orleans. In some ways his life was almost an obverse mirror image of parts of my own - I was a professional jazz musician but found myself teaching art history for a time. As Fiorella Superbi of I Tatti has said: Craig was a maestro di vita. I raise a glass in his memory and dedicate these sonnets to him. Gavin Bryars.
SKU: CF.YAS174
ISBN 9781491146545. UPC: 680160904044. 9 x 12 inches. Key: G major.
Composer Gregory Singer's waltz depicting the calm oasis of Central Park is fresh and new, but somehow immediately recognizable. Students and audiences alike will be taken by this piece from the very first note. It is an excellent piece to teach young string players about waltz style.As a child, I enjoyed roller skating at an amusement park in Portland Oregon named Oaks Park. I remember the waltz music playing as the announcement came Couples only, or All skate. Years later in New York City, I awakened from sleep one morning with the theme of this waltz in my ears. It was so cheerful and corny that I asked myself You’ve got to be kidding me, where did this melody come from? I realized it was my original. I notated it immediately, and a few weeks later I added the second musical theme and named it Central Park Waltz. It reminds me of the skating rinks that I have enjoyed over the years.
About Carl Fischer Young String Orchestra Series
This series of Grade 2/Grade 2.5 pieces is designed for second and third year ensembles. The pieces in this series are characterized by:--Occasionally extending to third position--Keys carefully considered for appropriate difficulty--Addition of separate 2nd violin and viola parts--Viola T.C. part included--Increase in independence of parts over beginning levels
SKU: HL.49003214
ISBN 9790220117282. UPC: 888680784249. 8.25x11.75x0.052 inches. Latin.
Glorious Hill may be performed by a male choir.Text by Pico della Mirandola (1463-1497) from De Hominis Dignitate.Glorious Hill was commissioned by the Hilliard Ensemble and first performed by them at its summer Festival of Voices in Lewes, Sussex, in August 1988. It was the first piece I wrote for the ensemble and I focused on the singers' unique ability to move with ease from early music to tonal music of the present day. There were techniques which I asked for which I hardly needed to notate - the staggered breathing of the two tenors to supply a continuous unbroken held note for example - and the piece moves between passages for solo voices and sections of highly chromatic homophony, almost as if the music were switching between the 12th century of Perotin and the 16th century of Gesualdo. Each of the four voices is given its own solo passage, sometimes accompanied, sometimes quietly supported by the other voices.The title, Glorious Hill comes from the name of the small-town Mississippi setting of Tennessee Williams' Summer and Smoke. I wrote the music for the 1987 production of this play at the Leicester Haymarket Theatre, the first time I had written any incidental music for the stage. Williams makes very specific demands in terms of music and there is one particularly powerful scene, the penultimate one, throughout which music and atmospheric sound effects are continuous. The principle character Alma argues passionately about the vital importance of human choice with the man to whom she has, too late, admitted her love. I watched this section every night throughout the 4 week run of the play watching the different ways in which the actress, Frances Barber, played the scene. There is a powerful emotional and philosophical connection between the imagery of this scene and a passage from the Renaissance philosopher Pico della Mirandola's Oration on the Dignity of Man which forms the text of Glorious Hill. This passage has been described as one of the few passages in Renaissance philosophy to treat human freedom in a modern way. The text, which is sung in Latin, is addressed by God to Adam before the fall from grace.Gavin Bryars.
SKU: HL.48025030
ISBN 9783793142973. UPC: 196288019947.
Composer's notes: “Once I received the commission by HD duo to compose a piece for sax and piano, I asked Michael Duke to select forme his favourite multiphonics for alto sax and send me a recording of them. I analysed the spectra of these recordings, establishingthe eight dominant partials for each one. I used these chords as the basic materials for the piece; this is why the work is called Spectrax. I then jammed over these chords in order to extract musical ideas, which I transcribed to the score. The final details of the piece where polished together with HD duo during the previous days to the world premiere at Mexico City in 2015.†Enrico Chapela.
