SKU: SU.80101244

This is an extended concert work (55 minutes) for solo piano. The work is set in a very long and freely-expressed rondo form. Throughout the duration of the piece there are four of five main ideas that are continually repeated and developed. There is much use of fast, cascading passages and tone clusters, but these are firmly contrasted with soft melody passages. The great white cosmic light is expressed by continual tremolando passages which reach their culmination at the very end of this long and expansive work.

SKU: PR.11641861SP

UPC: 680160685202.

What?! - my composer colleagues said - A concerto for the piano? It's a 19th century instrument! Admittedly we are in an age when originally created timbres and/or musico-technological formulations are often the modus operandi of a piece. Actually, this Concerto began about two years ago when, during one of my creative jogs, the sound of the uppermost register of the piano mingled with wind chimes penetrated my inner ear. The challenge and fascination of exploring and developing this idea into an orchestral situation determined that some day soon I would be writing a work for piano and orchestra. So it was a very happy coincidence when Mona Golabek phoned to tell me she would like discuss the Ford Foundation commission. After covering areas of aesthetics and compositional styles, we found that we had a good working rapport, and she asked if I would accept the commission. The answer was obvious. Then began the intensive thought process on the stylistic essence and organization of the work. Along with this went a renewed study of idiomatic writing for the piano, of the kind Stravinsky undertook with the violin when he began his Violin Concerto. By a stroke of great fortune, the day in February 1972 that I received official notice from the Ford Foundation of the commission, I also received a letter from the Guggenheim Foundation informing me I had been awarded my second fellowship. With the good graces of Zubin Mehta and Ernest Fleischmann, masters of my destiny as a member of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, I was relieved of my orchestral duties during the Hollywood Bowl season. Thus I was able to go to Europe to work and to view the latest trends in music concentrating in London (the current musical melting pot and showcase par excellence), Oslo, Norway, for the Festival of Scandinavian Music called Nordic Days, and Warsaw, Poland, for its prestigious Autumn Festival. Over half the Concerto was completed in that summer and most of the rest during the 72-73 season with the final touches put on during a month as Resident Scholar at the Rockefeller Foundation's Villa Serbelloni in Bellagio, Italy. So much for the external and environmental influences, except perhaps to mention the birds of Sussex in the first movement, the bells of Arhus (Denmark) in the second movement and the bells of Bellagio at the end of the Concerto. Primary in the conception was the personality of Miss Golabek: she is a wonderfully vital and dynamic person and a real virtuoso. Therefore, the soloist in the Concerto is truly the protagonist; it is she (for once we can do away with the generic he) who unfolds the character and intent of the piece. The first section is constructed in the manner of a recitative - completely unmeasured - with letters and numbers by which the conductor signals the orchestra for its participation. This allows the soloist the freedom to interpret the patterns and control the flow and development of the music. The Concerto is actually in one continuous movement but with three large divisions of sufficiently contrasting character to be called movements in themselves. The first 'movement' is based on a few timbral elements: 1) a cluster of very low pitches which at the beginning are practically inaudibly depressed, and sustained silently by the sostenuto pedal, which causes sympathetic vibrating pitches to ring when strong notes are struck; 2) a single powerful note indicated by a black note-head with a line through it indicating the strongest possible sforzando; 3) short figures of various colors sometimes ominous, sometimes as splashes of light or as elements of transition; 4) trills and tremolos which are the actual controlling organic thread starting as single axial tremolos and gradually expanding to trills of increasingly larger and more powerful scope. The 'movement' begins in quiescent repose but unceasingly grows in energy and tension as the stretching of a string or rubber band. When it can no longer be restrained, it bursts into the next section. The second 'movement,' propelled by the released tension, is a brilliant virtuosic display, which begins with a long solo of wispy percussion, later joined in duet with the piano. Not to be ignored, the orchestra takes over shooting the material throughout all its sections like a small agile bird deftly maneuvering through nothing but air, while the piano counterposes moments of lyricism. The orchestra reaches a climax, thrusting us into the third 'movement' which begins with a cadenza-like section for the piano. This moves gently into an expressive section (expressive is not a negative term to me) in which duets are formed with various instruments. There are fleeting glimpses of remembrances past, as a fragmented recapitulation. One glimpse is hazily expressed by strings and percussion in a moment of simultaneous contrasting levels of activity, a technique of which I have been fond and have utilized in various fixed-free relationships, particularly in my Percussion Concerto, Contextures and Games: Collage No. 1. The second half of the third 'movement; is a large coda - akin to those in Beethoven - which brings about another display of virtuosity, this time gutsy and driving, raising the Concerto to a final climax, the soloist completing the fragmented recapitulation concept as well as the work with the single-note sforzando and low cluster from the very opening of the first movement.

SKU: HH.HH052-KBD

ISBN 9790708041023.

This critical edition sheds light on the special qualities linking RV 198 (here published for the first time) to the musicians of the Saxon court, and offers the first detailed comparison between two versions of the concerto. Passages of brilliant figuration and finely spun diminutions characterize the solo episodes in the fast movements. An alternative Adagio is included in each of the various formats (scores, keyboard reduction and parts).

SKU: HL.50601940

UPC: 888680939540.

SKU: BT.MUSAM34851

ISBN 9780711904347. English.

The only piano course based throughout on today's popular songs and famous light classics. Easy to follow text and clear demonstration diagrams. Book Four introduces you to the piano pedals which add colour to yourplaying,syncopation, left hand fills, plus songs in the style of Boogie-Woogie, Modern Blues and Rock 'n' Roll. You will also learn to play in several new keys.

SKU: HL.14010480

ISBN 9788759870082. Danish.

Esperanza - Eremitkrebs-Tango (1997) Hermit Crab Tango, Esperanza is part of Norgard's Animals in Concert, a suite of piano pieces, so far comprised of:  1. A Tortoise's Tango (1984) - dur.: 4'  2. Light of a Night - Paul meets bird (1989) - dur.: 6'  3. Hermit Crab Tango - Esperanza (1997) - dur.: 5'  The pieces can be performed together or one by one.  In the1980s, quite a few “finds” turned up in Per Norgard's music. The material could be, say, a number of song birds' equilibrist melodic lines, the overtones of the ocean surf, or waltzing themes by the schizophrenic artist Adolf Wolfli (1864-1930). Or again, as heard here, it can be the rhythms and motifs of the tango and a Beatles song (with bird), explored in three independent piano pieces that form the Animals in Concert suite, about which the composer writes:  Programme note for Animals in Concert:  1. A Tortoise's Tango (1984) - dur.: 4'  2. Light of a Night - Paul meets bird (1989) - dur.: 6'  3. Hermit Crab Tango - Esperanza (1997) - dur.: 5'  The pieces can be performed together or one by one.  In the1980s, quite a few “finds” turned up in Per Norgard's music. The material could be, say, a number of song birds' equilibrist melodic lines, the overtones of the ocean surf, or waltzing themes by the schizophrenic artist Adolf Wolfli (1864-1930). Or again, as heard here, it can be the rhythms and motifs of the tango and a Beatles song (with bird), explored in three independent piano pieces that form the Animals in Concert suite, about which the composer writes:  “A Tortoise's Tango”: The tortoise as tango dancer must presumably possess certain rhythmic peculiarities, which I have chosen to express by letting the tune of the tortoise shuffle broadly, tripartite through the strict four partite time of tango.  Tortoise Tango was the original title of this piece, “written for Achilles” (the pianist Yvar Mikhashoff), for his so called tango project”, including new tangos for piano by composers from all over the world.  “Light of a Night (Paul meets bird)” was commissioned by pianist Aki Takahashi. It is a “reworked” arrangement for piano of the Beatles song ”Blackbird”. As some of us will recall, the Beatles on “The White Album” let the beautiful song to the blackbird be accompanied by an (apparently) live blackbird song. It is this authentic bird-motif world that in “Light of a Night” weaves itself into the Beatles melody and in turn is gradually infected by it, so that a completely new third entity ensues: a kind of Bird-rock ballad (or maybe it is a Beatle-bird?).  “Hermit Crab Tango (Esperanza)”: The tango situation is quite special for a Hermit Crab. It is a well-known fact that the hermit crab - this soft animal - must run the gauntlet among the many perils at the bottom of the sea when it must move hose. I have chosen to express the angers by a.

SKU: BT.EMBZ5411

English-German.

The history of Liszt's intensely virtuosic and unwaveringly popular Transcendental Etudes dates back to his 12 Etudes composed around 1826. Liszt later reworked 11 pieces of this not-so-technically-difficult series into virtuoso concert etudes, and replaced one of the etudes with a new piece. This version was published in 1837 under the name Grandes études. However, Liszt reworked these 12 big etudes again: the final version of the series - in which, with two exceptions, the pieces were titled - was published in 1851 under the series title Études d exécution transcendante. Transcendental Etudes was the very first volume of the New Liszt Complete Critical Edition, and it wasfirst published in 1970 based on the previous editions of the work. This edition includes footnotes highlighting common performance difficulties as well as English and German forewords, facsimiles, and critical notes in English.