Commissioned by the Wigmore Hall for the composer's 60th birthday with funds from ACNI.'viola:piano is one of a set of 6 pieces which I wrote in 2008 and 2009. Two of the others violin:piano and cello:piano requirethe instrumentalists to play at different tempi from each other throughout. In this piece the players are playing together but their material is for the most part quite different and for the first 12 minutes the two partshave little in common. It is only after this that they begin a more conventional contrapuntal relationship. This is the first of these pieces to be premiered. It was commissioned by the Wigmore Hall with funding from the ArtsCouncil of Ireland. The piece is dedicated to Mary R?rich.'????????????- Kevin Volans

Par NORMAN ANDREW. Sonnets is a collection of miniatures for cello and piano. To me, these micro-pieces are sonnets not in the rigorously formalized Elizabethan or Petrarchan senses of the word. Rather, they grow from the term's older, freer roots in the Italian word sonetto, meaning 'little song' or 'little sound.' Each of my five little songs takes as its title and point of inspiration a fragment from a Shakespeare sonnet. - Andrew Norman / Niveau : Avancé / Répertoire / Alto et Piano