SKU: HL.14028850
ISBN 9780711942530.
Invocation, Dance and Meditation by Robert Saxton, written in 1991 for viola and piano.
SKU: CF.CPS8
ISBN 9780825839962. UPC: 798408039967. 9 X 12 inches. Key: C minor.
Starting from a lovely and haunting melody introduced by the clarinets, Carl Strommen's Invocation and Dance, in two contrasting sections, is an object lesson in how to write memorably for young musicians using simple, straightforward and appealing material. The fast second section begins with some wonderful quiet percussion writing and the phrase and meter shifting versions of the original tune cleverly vary it before leading to the fully-scored return of the melody in its original form. This selection is contest and festival material of the highest quality. Duration: 4'40.
SKU: CL.012-4139-75
Influenced by the rhythms and dances of western Africa, this fiery work is sure to bring the house down at your next concert or contest performance. Accessible melodies, driving polyrhythms, and powerful scoring all combine to create an experience your students and audiences will be talking about for years!
SKU: PR.164002390
UPC: 680160038091.
I became interested in the work of Plato through my friend and collaborator, the writer and philosopher Paul Woodruff. Paul's new translation, with Alexander Nehamas, of the Symposium gave me insights into ancient Greek ways of thinking about Love, Beauty, and Wisdom -- and managed to keep the earthy, and often bawdy side of it all in full view. But their new translation of Plato's later dialogue Phaedrus went even further: the beauty of the speeches is breathtaking, and the discourse itself is enough to keep one awake at night. Basically the Great Speech of Socrates in the Phaedrus dialogue has to do with the place of Eros in the world, and with the conflict in the soul between fleshly pleasure and philosophic discovery. I will not attempt to encapsulate this brilliant discourse in a program note: suffice it to say that reading it gave rise to my two-sided work for clarinet, violin, and piano, Phaedrus. The first movement represents the Philosophic life, and is thus subtitled Apollo's Lyre (Invocation and Hymn). It begins with an unaccompanied melody for the clarinet, which (after a pair of harp-like flourishes for the piano, expands into an accompanied canon. The voices in the dialogue (clarinet and violin) follow each other by a prescribed number of beats, but the music is totally devoid of any meter at all. The piano, representing the lyre, accompanies this lyric love-feast with repeated strummed chords. The canon has three large sections, and ends with violin echoing the unaccompanied clarinet invocation as the sound of the lyre fades. The second movement, called Dionysus' Dream-Orgy (Ritual Dance) presents, after a brief introduction, another kind of unmetered music. Rather than long lyric flights of philosophic song, however, this time we hear a unison dance of unbridled energy and sensual transport. The piece soon forms itself into a loose arch form, with contrasting metered dance sections divided by the unison unmetered orgy tune. Midway through the movement, Apollo's melody returns from the first movement, but it is a temporary reminiscence. The orgiastic dance returns, reaches a climax, and ends with a stomping of feet. While Plato asserts that a proper balance between lust and reason is necessary in all men, he (naturally) gives the nod to Philosophy as the better choice in which to live. Not so in my music: the two sides are meant to coexist and to complement each other. No sides are taken. Phaedrus was commissioned of the Verdehr Trio by Michigan State University. It is dedicated to the Vedehr Trio with great affection and admiration.
SKU: TM.05811SET
P/C in set.
SKU: BC.67142
SKU: SU.80604121
Extra Hand Clapper partSoprano, Alto Saxophones and Hand Clappers Duration: 4'30 Composed: 1979 Published by: E.B. Marks.
SKU: HH.HH215-SOL
ISBN 9790708059523.
In my compositions, the performer is often a wizard communing with the spirits in a kind of celestial dance. Star King of Day starts with a song of peace and an invocation and as the spirits enter the body of the shaman we hear their dialogue through the instruments.