"Grande Rag Brillante" for piano Op. 15
Piano Solo - MP3 Download

Piano - Digital Download

SKU: A0.1069664

Composed by Gary Noland. 20th Century,Concert,Contemporary,Ragtime. Full Performance. Duration 892. Freeland Publications #3238281. Published by Freeland Publications (A0.1069664).

Duration: 14'52" (1989). Computer-driven Yamaha Disklavier performance. One of my more "famous" pieces. Its historic premiere at Pacifica Radio (KPFA) in Berkeley on 4 October, 1991 to inaugurate their new facility is included in Nicolas Slonimsky's book "Music Since 1900." It has been reviewed and written about extensively. Here is what some reviewers have said:

"4 OCTOBER 1991: KPFA radio in Berkeley, California, dedicates its newly constructed, two-story broadcast facility at 1929 Martin Luther King Jr. Way with a live satellite broadcast … works on the inaugual program, produced and narrated by KPFA Music director Charles Amirkhanian, included … Grande Rag Brilliant [sic] by Gary NOLAND, a 15-minute rag introducing KPFA’s new Yamaha Disklavier grand piano, featuring fugues, frozen grace-notes to produce tone clusters, and a lengthy passage in which the music modulates up and down a half-tone each measure ("the turntable change of speed effect") …"-Nicolas Slonimsky, Music Since 1900  

 

            "...remarkable stuff..."-Max Morath, ragtime composer and pianist

 

            "… smashing and extremely difficult piano rag, … which is not distracted by the modulation-per-minute insanity of this beautiful and disorienting music … an exceedingly difficult composition by Berkeley composer Gary Noland, … the Grande Rag Brillante, Op. 15, was written in a modified turn-of-the-Century style and has never been performed successfully by a human pianist.  It features something Mr. Noland calls the 'record-player-turntable-change-of-speed-effect.'  In certain sections, each successive measure modulates up a half step into the next key signature, providing a mind-bending spiraling of focus which is truly breathtaking … spectacular… "-Charles Amirkhanian, Folio (KPFA program guide)

 

            "...The Impossible Rag..."-Oakland Tribune

 

            "...perfectly simulates a piano roll mistracking and continually changing keys..."

-Dick Zimmerman, Rag Times

 

            "...masterpiece!...We recommend Mr. Noland's music for anybody who desires the witty and unexpected approach to the Ragtime idiom."-L. Douglas Henderson, ARTCRAFT Studio Newsletter, Wiscasset, Maine

 

            "...Ihre Musik ist wunderschön, "Grande Rag Brillante" ist ein Meisterwerk;  als auch Komponist bin ich voll Neid, dass ich so etwas nicht schreiben kann. Ich wünsche Ihnen viel Erfolg!  Ich komponiere schon viele Jahre europäisch tonal und es itst nicht leicht, so zu komponieren in einer Welt, die noch in der atonalen Ideologie denkt. Ich hoffe, Ihr Weg wird leichter...."-Ladislav Kupkovic, Czech-born composer residing in Germany

 

                    "Sort of like it ... electronicized ... ; then it becomes a real period piece, like Richard Taruskin’s theory about current HIP practitioners ..."-William Bolcom, Pulitzer prize winning composer.

 

            "...Gary Noland's music is complex, technically daunting stuff....'Grande Rag Brillante'... seems to be meant as an excercise in psychedelic ragtime piano, full of extremely fast passages, confusing modulations, and bizzare dissonance...."

-Butch Thompson, The Mississippi Rag

 

             "...KPFA Music Director Charles Amirkhanian plans to use the new Disklavier.