SKU: HL.283507

Exit Music for Orchestra was composed by Bent Sorensen in 2006-07. Exit Music was commissioned by the Bergen International Festival for the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra, and is dedicated to Per Norgard on the occasion of his 75th birthday. Programme note It began with a dream, as it always does when I compose. I dreamt that I was standing in an open doorway on a hill in an otherwise open landscape. I do not know what was behind the door, but in front of it - towards the landscape - I saw my music disappearing. I stood looking for the music, and started to hear it, to remember it in time with its disappearance. The dream continued to recur as strange pictures in my daydreams, and I continued to try to write down the music that had vanished. It was also the dream that gave the piece its title- Exit Music. Exit Music is based on three simple songs (the songs that vanish through the doorway): a little lullaby, which continues to reappearin fragments; a strange polyphonic pop song that refers to a section of my opera Under the Sky; and a passionate little love song, which concludes the piece on the strings, very quietly and in unison. These simple songs are then constantly overpainted by enervating repeated motes in fairly simple rhythms, which push the songs out of the room. (Bent Sorensen).

SKU: BT.YKM570369270

A Hymn to the Thames was commissioned by James Turnbull and the Music Director of the St Paul’s Sinfonia, Andrew Morley. It was begun in 2019 and completed early in 2020. There are four movements played without a break, which follow the Thames from its Cotswold source to the North Sea. As the first performance took place in St ALfege’s Church, Greenwich, this seemed appropriate. The solo oboe represents both a wanderer along the river path and the spirit of the river. The pitch centres of the movements spell out the musical letters of the river (tHAmES—B natural, A, E and E flat) so that the river’s name is projected across the whole work. In addition, the musical letters found in James Turnbull, Andrew Morley and my wife, Teresa Cahill ( who was born in Maidenhead and brought up by the river in Rotherhithe) are entwined in various guises. The first movement grows from the depths, the soloist entering with fanfare-like gestures, followed by lyrical music and breaks into a dance as the river gathers momentum. The third movement is slow and sustained and geographically the Thames flows through Oxford. The music is based on the well-known In Nomine ‘head motif’ from the Gloria tibi Trinitas Mass by the early Tudor composer, John Taverner, who was the first Director of Music at Christ Church, Oxford. The orchestra provides a screen or veil above which the solo oboe dreams and ruminates. This leads directly into the fourth and final movement which begins in the depths once more, interrupting the oboe’s held note from the end of the third movement. The waters’ increasing intensity and power are represented throughout by a moto perpetuo of quick, steady semiquavers. Near the close, the woodwind play O Nata Lux by Thomas Tallis, the great Tudor composer who, with his wife Joan, is buried in St Alfege’s. Beneath this, the lower strings continue the fast semiquaver movement of the river and, above, the violins are heard as a halo of harmonics. At the close, the oboe rises, opening out to the future, and celebrating its voyage, while the orchestra fades as the river meets the sea. A Hymn to the Thames lasts approximately 17 minutes.

SKU: AP.49879S

ISBN 9781470663780. UPC: 038081580807. English.

Dreams is one of the great Van Halen songs now transcribed for string orchestra. As a string player, I was enamored with Eddie Van Halen. He was a big influence on me while I was studying at Juilliard. I purposely lowered the key to A major for better playability. The tempo is brisk, yet very attainable. The upbeat and positive posture of this composition was a big attraction to me as a musician, and it was an honor for me to show great respect to the song and our string world! The play-along tracks feature my personal band! (4:35).