(Favola in musica in un prologo e cinque atti). Composed by Claudio Monteverdi (1567-1643). Edited by Rinaldo Alessandrini. For soprano voice solo (7), tenor voice solo (4), bass voice solo (3), SSATTB choir, TTBBB choir, orchestra. This edition: Urtext edition. Paperback. Score. Language: Italian, Text Language: Italian/English/German. 141 pages. Published by Baerenreiter Verlag

Edited by Howard Wallach. Guitar tablature songbook and accompaniment CD for guitar and voice. 47 pages. Published by National Guitar Workshop Publications.

Band Concert Band

SKU: PR.465000130

For Large Wind Ensemble. Composed by Dan Welcher. Sws. Contemporary. Full score. With Standard notation. Composed 2010. Duration 14 minutes. Theodore Presser Company #465-00013. Published by Theodore Presser Company (PR.465000130).

ISBN 9781598064070. UPC: 680160600144. 9x12 inches.

Following a celebrated series of wind ensemble tone poems about national parks in the American West, Dan Welcher’s Upriver celebrates the Lewis & Clark Expedition from the Missouri River to Oregon’s Columbia Gorge, following the Louisiana Purchase of 1803. Welcher’s imaginative textures and inventiveness are freshly modern, evoking our American heritage, including references to Shenandoah and other folk songs known to have been sung on the expedition. For advanced players. Duration: 14’.
In 1803, President Thomas Jefferson sent Meriwether Lewis and William Clark’s Corps of Discovery to find a water route to the Pacific and explore the uncharted West. He believed woolly mammoths, erupting volcanoes, and mountains of pure salt awaited them. What they found was no less mind-boggling: some 300 species unknown to science, nearly 50 Indian tribes, and the Rockies.Ihave been a student of the Lewis and Clark expedition, which Thomas Jefferson called the “Voyage of Discovery,” for as long as I can remember. This astonishing journey, lasting more than two-and-a-half years, began and ended in St. Louis, Missouri — and took the travelers up more than a few rivers in their quest to find the Northwest Passage to the Pacific Ocean. In an age without speedy communication, this was akin to space travel out of radio range in our own time: no one knew if, indeed, the party had even survived the voyage for more than a year. Most of them were soldiers. A few were French-Canadian voyageurs — hired trappers and explorers, who were fluent in French (spoken extensively in the region, due to earlier explorers from France) and in some of the Indian languages they might encounter. One of the voyageurs, a man named Pierre Cruzatte, also happened to be a better-than-average fiddle player. In many respects, the travelers were completely on their own for supplies and survival, yet, incredibly, only one of them died during the voyage. Jefferson had outfitted them with food, weapons, medicine, and clothing — and along with other trinkets, a box of 200 jaw harps to be used in trading with the Indians. Their trip was long, perilous to the point of near catastrophe, and arduous. The dream of a Northwest Passage proved ephemeral, but the northwestern quarter of the continent had finally been explored, mapped, and described to an anxious world. When the party returned to St. Louis in 1806, and with the Louisiana Purchase now part of the United States, they were greeted as national heroes.Ihave written a sizeable number of works for wind ensemble that draw their inspiration from the monumental spaces found in the American West. Four of them (Arches, The Yellowstone Fires, Glacier, and Zion) take their names, and in large part their being, from actual national parks in Utah, Wyoming, and Montana. But Upriver, although it found its voice (and its finale) in the magnificent Columbia Gorge in Oregon, is about a much larger region. This piece, like its brother works about the national parks, doesn’t try to tell a story. Instead, it captures the flavor of a certain time, and of a grand adventure. Cast in one continuous movement and lasting close to fourteen minutes, the piece falls into several subsections, each with its own heading: The Dream (in which Jefferson’s vision of a vast expanse of western land is opened); The Promise, a chorale that re-appears several times in the course of the piece and represents the seriousness of the presidential mission; The River; The Voyageurs; The River II ; Death and Disappointment; Return to the Voyage; and The River III .The music includes several quoted melodies, one of which is familiar to everyone as the ultimate “river song,” and which becomes the through-stream of the work. All of the quoted tunes were either sung by the men on the voyage, or played by Cruzatte’s fiddle. From various journals and diaries, we know the men found enjoyment and solace in music, and almost every night encampment had at least a bit of music in it. In addition to Cruzatte, there were two other members of the party who played the fiddle, and others made do with singing, or playing upon sticks, bones, the ever-present jaw harps, and boat horns. From Lewis’ journals, I found all the tunes used in Upriver: Shenandoah (still popular after more than 200 years), V’la bon vent, Soldier’s Joy, Johnny Has Gone for a Soldier, Come Ye Sinners Poor and Needy (a hymn sung to the tune “Beech Spring”) and Fisher’s Hornpipe. The work follows an emotional journey: not necessarily step-by-step with the Voyage of Discovery heroes, but a kind of grand arch. Beginning in the mists of history and myth, traversing peaks and valleys both real and emotional (and a solemn funeral scene), finding help from native people, and recalling their zeal upon finding the one great river that will, in fact, take them to the Pacific. When the men finally roar through the Columbia Gorge in their boats (a feat that even the Indians had not attempted), the magnificent river combines its theme with the chorale of Jefferson’s Promise. The Dream is fulfilled: not quite the one Jefferson had imagined (there is no navigable water passage from the Missouri to the Pacific), but the dream of a continental destiny.

Chamber Music String Quartet

SKU: PR.14440727S

Composed by Sydney F. Hodkinson. Sws. Full score. 44 pages. Duration 22 minutes. Merion Music #144-40727S. Published by Merion Music (PR.14440727S).

UPC: 680160681907. 9 x 12 inches.

My Eighth and Ninth String Quartets, begun in late 2017, are sonic cousins. Akin to real cousins, each piece exhibits differing natures. They were requested by two ensembles that have become asecond familiesa to me: The Jupiter Quartet of Urbana, Illinois and the Amernet Quartet based in Miami, Florida. Their collective dedication to, and care for, our art remains a personal and constant are-fuelinga for me. The quartets were commissioned by, and dedicated to, Margaret and Philip Verleger of Denver, Colorado. Additional financial support was provided by the School of Music at Stetson University, Timothy Peter, Dean. Quartet No.8 is laid out in a classical four-movement design. The work does break somewhat from conventional tradition by often placing quartet members into soloistic roles as the movement titles note. individual The opening piece presents at the outset a three-note motto which is turned over, tumbled, and energetically discussed, primarily by a violin duet. It is a duel. The two players part company only infrequently during the movement's progress, pausing briefly for other commentary by their alower cohortsa, the Viola and Cello do not argue, but abet their friends' aeffortsa. The piece's overall character is fairly bright and dancelike, closing in an unresolvedastandoffa. not Two principal asound-objectsa stitch the second movement scherzo together: sliding hands (glissandos) and a plucked ashufflea (pizzicato) - both instigated by the (solo) cellist. The others are influenced - or are not - by their aleadera, and follow - or interrupt - the cello throughout their four-voiced conversation. The third movement (longest of the set) is an elegy dedicated to the memory of a close personal friend, the American composer David Maslanka (1943 - 2017). Its' genesis is a simple 5-note melody derived from my own name (SaC/DaC/EaC/H). This line commences in the (solo) viola and is obsessively uttered without relief during the movement's lamentations. The closing movement revisits much of that opening three-note material, but now dressed up for the full quartet to view. It is a slowly accelerating romp which - twice - cannot avoid a nod to the Amernet and Jupiter performers by offering a humble bow to the 4th movement of Gustav Holst's PLANETS - Jupiter: The Bringer of Jollity. My quartet serves as an honouring salute of thanks for the talent, respect, and friendship of these two young quartets. STRING QUARTET No. 8 is roughly 22 minutes in duration. It was written as an homage to Franz Joseph Haydn, my adesert-island-composera, and completed in Holly Hill, Florida in early April of 2019. S.H.

Unison voices, SATB choir, assembly, organ accompaniment, percussion - Beginning

SKU: GI.G-5329

Composed by John Eggert. Arranged by John Eggert. Eastertide, Easter Sunday. Choral. Tune name: Angoni War Song. Sacred. Octavo. 12 pages. GIA Publications #5329. Published by GIA Publications (GI.G-5329).

UPC: 785147532903. English. Text Source: Based on an African Chewa hymn; Translation: Tom S. Colvin.

This is a hidden gem! An African resurrection hymn artfully arranged for choir and assembly. The accompaniment includes organ (somewhat unusually scored), xylophone, drum, and axatse (a large hollow gourd with beads tied around the outside). The tunes remains unharmonized, but has some choral countermelodies. The refrain after each of the four verses is a series of alleluias. SATB or Unison. Percussion: Xylophone, Drum (African, Conga), Axatse.  

Based on African Chewa hymn.