SKU: PR.16400272S

UPC: 680160588442. 8.5 x 11 inches.

My third quartet is laid out in a three-movement structure, with each movement based on an early, middle, and late work of the great American impressionist painter Mary Cassatt. Although the movements are separate, with full-stop endings, the music is connected by a common scale-form, derived from the name MARY CASSATT, and by a recurring theme that introduces all three movements. I see this theme as Mary's Theme, a personality that stays intact while undergoing gradual change.   I The Bacchante (1876) [Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania]   The painting shows a young girl of Italian or Spanish origin, playing a small pair of cymbals. Since Cassatt was trying very hard to fit in at the French Academy at the time, she painted a lot of these subjects, which were considered typical and universal. The style of the painting doesn't yet show Cassatt's originality, except perhaps for certain details in the face. Accordingly the music for this movement is Spanish/Italian, in a similar period-style but using the musical signature described above. The music begins with Mary's Theme, ruminative and slow, then abruptly changes to an alla Spagnola-type fast 3/4 - 6/8 meter. It evokes the Spanish-influenced music of Ravel and Falla.   Midway through, there's an accompanied recitative for the viola, which figures large in this particular movement, then back to a truncated recapitulation of the fast music. The overall feeling is of a well-made, rather conventional movement in a contemporary Spanish/Italian style. Cassatt's painting, too, is rather conventional.   II At the Opera (1880) [Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Massachusetts]   This painting is one of Cassatt's most well known works, and it hangs in the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. The painting shows a woman alone in a box at the opera house, completely dressed (including gloves) and looking through opera glasses at someone or something that is NOT on the stage. Across the auditorium from her, but exactly at eye level, is a gentleman with opera glasses intently watching her - though it is not him that she's looking at. It's an intriguing picture.   This movement is far less conventional than the first movement, as the painting is far less conventional. The music begins with a rapid, Shostakovich-type mini-overture lasting less than a minute, based on Mary's Theme. My conjecture is that the woman in the painting has arrived late to the opera, busily stumbling into her box. What happens next is a kind of collage, a kind of surrealistic overlaying of two different elements: the foreground music, at first is a direct quotation of Soldier's Chorus from Gounod's FAUST (an opera Cassatt would certainly have heard in the brand-new Paris Opera House at that time), played by Violin II, Viola, and Cello. This music is played sul ponticello in the melody and col legno in the marching accompaniment. On top of this, the first violin hovers at first on a high harmonic, then descends into a slow melody, completely separate from the Gounod. It's as if the woman in the painting is hearing the opera onstage but is not really interested in it. Then the cello joins the first violin in a kind of love-duet (just the two of them, at first). This music isn't at all Gounod-derived; it's entirely from the same scale patterns as the first movement and derives from Mary's Theme and its scale. The music stays in a kind of dichotomy feeling, usually three-against-one, until the end of the movement, when another Gounod melody, Valentin's aria Avant de quitter ce lieux reappears in a kind of coda for all four players. It ends atmospherically and emotionally disconnected, however. The overall feeling is a kind of schizophrenic, opera-inspired dream.   III Young Woman in Green, Outdoors in the Sun (1909) [Worcester Art Museum, Massachusetts]   The painting, one of Cassatt's last, is very simple: just a figure, looking sideways out of the picture. The colors are pastel and yet bold - and the woman is likewise very self-assured and not in the least demure. It is eight minutes long, and is all about melody - three melodies, to be exact (Young Woman, Green, and Sunlight). No angst, no choppy rhythms, just ever-unfolding melody and lush harmonies. I quote one other French composer here, too: Debussy's song Green, from Ariettes Oubliees. 1909 would have been Debussy's heyday in Paris, and it makes perfect sense musically as well as visually to do this.   Mary Cassatt lived her last several years in near-total blindness, and as she lost visual acuity, her work became less sharply defined - something akin to late water lilies of Monet, who suffered similar vision loss. My idea of making this movement entirely melodic was compounded by having each of the three melodies appear twice, once in a pure form, and the second time in a more diffuse setting. This makes an interesting two ways form: A-B-C-A1-B1-C1.   String Quartet No.3 (Cassatt) is dedicated, with great affection and respect, to the Cassatt String Quartet, whose members have dedicated themselves in large measure to the furthering of the contemporary repertoire for quartet.

SKU: BT.WH30668

ISBN 9788759812310. International.

In Latin Anima means soul but it is also a Jungian expression for the female element of the male. Anima forms the first part of a nameless trilogy of solo concertos, which emphasizes reflective moods. In this cello concerto it is mainly the melodic aspect that is in the foreground, a bitter-sweet but always gentle song for cello.

SKU: MN.20-407

UPC: 688670204074.

Three stanzas of text are set to the hymn tune ELLACOMBE. An introduction quotes snippets of the tune, followed by stanza one for unison congregation with the brass echoing imitatively. The texture changes in stanza two as the French horn takes the foreground in the accompaniment, with the organ supporting the congregation. The final stanza has the trumpets leaping in baroque-like fanfares at first, then the imitative echoes return. Dignified but joyful, this majestic setting will add to your Easter service.

SKU: ST.C397

ISBN 9790570813971.

1. Auf Flügeln des Gesanges (On Wings of Song)

The text is from Lyrisches Intermezzo of 1823 by Heinrich Heine (1797-1856) and tells of melody’s power to transport lovers to the most beautiful night garden, with bright and fragrant flowers, gazelles, a murmuring stream, and a palm tree, under which they can dream. It is well known in the setting by Mendelssohn, written in 1834.

2. Seit Ich Ihn Gesehen (Since I First Saw Him)

The text is from Adelbert von Chamisso’s set of poems Frauen-Liebe und Leben, most famously set by Schumann in 1840. A young girl cries that she has been blinded by the vision of a gentleman who has unknowingly lifted her from darkness. Overwhelmed by the new emotions of adoration and infatuation, she retreats into isolation.

This new edition supersedes the Nova Music publication of 1982 (NM249) and the European Archive edition (EMA119), originally edited by Georgina Dobrée, both now out of print. This edition is fully re-edited and includes the option of a second clarinet in place of the voice.

Voice, clarinet & piano (or two clarinets & piano)
Former Spartan Press Cat. No.: NM249.

SKU: JF.MLAHB1090

UPC: 765844005146.

The eglantine is a sweetbriar wild rose of Europe and central Asia. It has small fragrant pink flowers. This image is portrayed in the musical score through use of andante tempo, mallets on suspended bells, and simple rhythms.

SKU: P2.30086

In the beginning of January, 2000 I completed a large-scale work for clarinet and orchestra. Upon its completion, I felt somewhat exhausted by the flashy and virtuoso style of writing which tends to typify the solo parts of concerti. This time... I decided to forfeit any pyrotechnical exhibitions by the soloist in favor of incorporating the instrument into the larger fabric of the orchestra. Concurrent with starting to work on this new piece, I was engaged in an altogether different project involving, among others, a Swedish deejay whose field of expertise is popular, modern dance-music.... During numerous evenings of CD listening to this genre of music, I was drawn to the way that rhythmically contrasting layers of music were constantly alternating between background and foreground. The resulting effect was of a continuously changing 'groove-pattern' even though the 'beat' of the music remained constant. I used this style of writing mainly in the fast, second section of the piece, which I felt gave it a distinct technotronic flavor. The mood of the opening movement is, however, undeniably romantic: thus the title of the piece, Romantatronic.

SKU: BR.KM-2543

World premiere: Gwangju/Corea, November 24, 2016

ISBN 9790004504567. 9 x 12 inches.

Lahara - which literally means 'wave' - is a term used in Indian music to describe a repeating melodic phrase that accompanies table and pakhawaj solo. In such a traditional context the lahara would be played by a melodic instrument such as the sarangi, functioning as a background against which the flourishing virtuosity of the soloist could evolve. In my piece this function is also present in the form of a long line stated three times fully in the Thai gongs, however there is no virtuosic soloist. Instead, the musical evolution (if it is that) takes the form of a resonant ceremony enacted on bell plates and steel pans, situated not only on-stage but in four locations around the audience. If you want to look for it, the idea of waves can also be seen in other aspects of the piece: the slow wave of the gradual progression of players from the back of the hall to the front, which defines the form of the piece; the waves of tam-tam crescendi at the end of each statement of the lahara; maybe even in the way that the foreground melodic figurations progressively increase in density over the course of the piece until they completely dominate our perception, before suddenly disappearing… And on a more concrete note every sound is, after all, a wave. (Christian Mason, 2016)

World premiere: Gwangju/Korea, The Asian Arts Theatre, November 24, 2016.

SKU: HL.49016913

ISBN 9790001147620. UPC: 884088262228. 9.0x12.0x0.127 inches.

Mustonen belongs to the young generation of composing piano virtuosos. What is remarkable is that 'his instrument' is not placed in the foreground of his works. He rather composed pieces for strings, sonatas with piano accompaniment, orchestral works and even a piece for guitar referring to the history of his home country Finland.The cello sonata was premiered by Mustonen with the cellist Daniel Muller-Schott in Hamburg. No special emphasis is given to polyphonic coexistence; instead, the piano, playing chordally, acts as a real accompaniment most of the time. Cantilenas of the cello, tricky rhythms, and almost symphonic sound eruptions make the piece a sure-fire hit with the public.