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: HL.51481539
UPC: 196288308164. 9.25x12.0x0.16 inches.
During a concert tour through California in early 1920, Prokofiev composed five songs with piano accompaniment and textless voice parts, which appeared in print as Five Songs without Words op. 35 and with a dedication to the soprano Nina Koshetz. The quasi-instrumental conception of the work as vocalises accompanied by piano suggested an arrangement for violin and piano, which the composer then indeed undertook in 1925. Enriched with octave transpositions, double stops, harmonics and pizzicati, the violin part of the five pieces gained an enormous variety of additional expressive possibilities. No wonder the Five Melodies op. 35a today number among the Russian master's most popular chamber music works! Henle is publishing them for the first time as an Urtext edition based on all available sources. Simon Morrison, a true Prokofiev specialist, contributed the preface.
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SKU: PR.701486020
UPC: 888680653941.
O Magnum Mysterium, commissioned by Marshall Rutter in honor of his wife, Terry Knowles, has had several thousand performances throughout the world and dozens of recordings since its 1994 premiere by the Los Angeles Master Chorale. I have also arranged the work for solo voice and piano or organ (recorded on Northwest Journey by Jane Thorngren accompanied by the composer), men's chorus and brass ensemble; H. Robert Reynold's stunning adaptation for symphonic winds was recently premiered in Minneapolis by the Thornton Wind Symphony. For centuries, composers have been inspired by the beautiful O Magnum Mysterium text depicting the birth of the new-born King amongst the lowly animals and shepherds. This affirmation of God's grace to the meek and the adoration of the Blessed Virgin are celebrated in my setting through a quiet song of profound inner joy. – Morten Lauridsen.
SKU: HL.48025319
UPC: 196288175384.
Note by the composer:“This piece was written in 2006 (for violoncello and piano) for an exhibition dedicated to artists suffering from schizophrenia. Thebasis of the piece is a sequence of four chords, very simple and minimalistic. A person with schizophrenia hears voices that can be very disturbing; there is a longing for silence. I wrote this piece so that my son Alex, who suffers from the illness, could hear silence and meditation from it. It's called Blue Silence because blue is sometimes associated with healing.†Elena Kats-Chernin.