SKU: SU.32040050

Woodwind Quintet (Flute, Oboe, Clarinet, Horn, Bassoon) Duration: 6' Composed: 2012 Published by: Amy Mills Music, LLC 3 movements I. Seven Toes Down II. En Pointe III. Muddy Boots This charming suite has three short movements, each with its own character. The suite bursts open with breathless energy. Seven Toes Down is modal, in 7/8 time, with people dancing in bare feet on bare ground, so vigorously that it kicks up the dust. En Pointe opens with a lovely waltz, then it focuses in on the tiny, delicate movements of a ballerina high up on her toes. Muddy Boots is big strong guys, covered with dirt from a hard day of work, practicing one-upmanship. Different players have the chance to show what they can do, surrounded by their friends. Then we catch another glimpse of the ballerina before closing playfully with Seven Toes Down. Difficulty Level: 4 (Advanced) See composer website for audio sample.

SKU: FG.55011-509-5

ISBN 9790550115095.

Kimmo Hakola's Wind Quintet op. 96 (2017) was commissioned by the Kimito Island Music Festival. The composer sees that making the ensemble ultimately breathe and express itself as an organic, coherent subject should be the aim in composing for wind quintet. The normal chamber-music configuration is not a sufficient basis for me in composing a wind quintet: the instruments have to be compressed, reduced, even crushed together so that, in pairs and different combinations, they produce new, viable audio units. Collision often generates something new. Kimmo Hakola has gone through a number of styles and influences in his career as a composer, his idiom expanding at times to embrace Romanticism, Orientalism and klezmer. He has attained international recognition with an output that spans various genres from intimate solo works to full-length operas such as La Fenice (2011) commissioned by the Savonlinna Opera Festival. Many of his works are expansive and epic: his Piano Concerto (1996), for instance, clocks in at 55 minutes. Hakola says that he sees music as drama. His dramas explore almost Shakespearean extremes, from moments of raging sound and fury and violent battles to quiet moments of meditation and heart-rending monologues.