String quartet

SKU: FG.55011-510-1

Composed by Matthew Whittall. Score and parts. Fennica Gehrman #55011-510-1. Published by Fennica Gehrman (FG.55011-510-1).

ISBN 9790550115101.

Matt hew Whittall's preface to Bright Ferment (2019): I have a complicated history with the string quartet. Actually, it's not that complicated. I spent months writing a huge one in my early twenties and hastily withdrew it after a long delayed premiere, vowing never to write another. In a typical case of karmic retribution, my fear of the form would eventually be overcome by the unrefusable offer to write the compulsory piece for the Banff International String Quartet Competition in my native Canada. The short duration requested, about nine minutes, also felt like a good way to wade gingerly back into the medium. The title was originally just a nice-sounding pair of words that surfaced in a brainstorming session with fellow composer Alex Freeman over an injudicious amount of fermented barley. When I looked it up later, I found that it was a phrase of older coinage, seemingly used more for poetic resonance than any fixed meaning. Ferment by itself denotes a state of confusion, change or lack of order. With bright, it takes on a more positive connotation with regard to society and creativity: a wild profusion of ideas barely checked by reason. (It may not actually mean that, but it describes this piece nicely, so let's go with it.) Fermentation in its trendy culinary usage is also hinted at via a recurrent percolating device of scattered pizzicati. As one may guess from the tone of this introduction, there is little attempt at gravity in Bright Ferment, the only means by which I felt I could sidestep the historical and expressive weight of the string quartet genre. Styles, gestures and moods are tossed around, cross-cut and abandoned in stream-of-consciousness fashion, connected by little except an intuitive sense of rightness in their juxtaposition. If the piece acquires depth in spite of me, it will only be because its disparate parts amplify and strengthen each other simply by being together - much like the ensemble itself. Bright Ferment was commissioned by the Banff Centre for the Arts and Creativity and the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, with additional funding from the Americas Society (New York), for the 2019 Banff International String Quartet Competition. Duration: ca. 9 minutes.

String Quartet 2Vln.Vla.Vlc

SKU: PE.EP68680

Composed by George Lewis. Edition Peters. Contemporary. Score and Part(s). 128 pages. Edition Peters #98-EP68680. Published by Edition Peters (PE.EP68680).

ISBN 9790300762616.

A lthough his Signifying Riffs (1998) for percussion and strings is halfway there, String Quartet 1.5: Experiments in Living (2016) is the first proper string quartet by composer George Lewis. Borrowing its title from the writings of John Stuart Mill, Experiments in Living leads the performers through a series of idiosyncratic episodes featuring extremes of gesture and extended technique over the course of a single, 16-minute movement.

Commissio ned by the Fromm Foundation, String Quartet 1.5: Experiments in Living was composed for Spektral Quartet, who gave the premiere performance in October 2016 at Chicago's Harris Theater. This set of score and parts has been made available for sale by Edition Peters as part of the Peters Contemporary Chamber Series and includes full performance notes. Chopsticks and superball mallets are required to achieve some of the score's percussive playing techniques.

Th is product is Printed on Demand and may take several weeks to fulfill. Please order from your favorite retailer.

String quartet

SKU: BO.B.3664

Composed by Jordi Cervello. Published by Editorial de Musica Boileau (BO.B.3664).

Cuarteto San Petersburgo (The Saint Petersburg Quartet) was written between January and March 2011. It owes its name to the fact that Saint Petersburg has been a very significant city for me. I was invited there in 1988 to take part in a big contemporary music festival, but my uninterrupted bond with the city started on 2002, thanks to the negotiations of my friend and pupil Albert Barbeta. Since then, I have constantly travelled there in order to record a considerable part of my repertoire: seventeen pieces. In addition to the concerts we went to, I took the opportunity during my trips to visit the well-known conservatoire where so many great personalities from the world of music composition once taught, and the place that launched the most important violin school in the whole of Russia: the school of Leopoldo Auer. Spending a long time in Auer's classroom writing my concert for violin and orchestra was an unforgettable experience for me. His large portrait motivated me even further.

Cuartet o San Petersburgo evokes many of the most cherished and moving moments that I have had in this city. It is structured in four movements. The first one, Allegretto-Allegro, opens with an introduction that sets forth the two main themes, amid a soft and elastic atmosphere. The Allegro starts vigorously and in it we find changes in the tempo and moments of mystery, as well as certain seclusion, returning then to the emphatic theme where the counterpoint finds its place. The movement ends placidly.

The Scherzo-marcato that follows is marked by a persistent rhythm of triplets that carries on from beginning to end. The tempo does not change, but brief and decided themes are introduced, as well as passages of counterpoint. Brief and dissonant chords are heard throughout the movement, which ends vigorously.

The third movement, Ut, is a very special one. For a while already I had been playing with the idea of writing a movement that was to have the tonality C as a leitmotiv. This one is made up by two slow and static parts. In the first one, the first violin plays pizzicatti-glissandi. In the second, the first violin and particularly the violoncello settle on C while the other two instruments produce descending chromatic harmonies.

Final ly, the Introduccion-Presto (the Introduction-Presto). It starts with some bucolic passages which remind us of the introduction to the first movement. A fast and energetic Presto suddenly erupts. A kind of moto perpetuo which alternates with two expressive passages and, towards the end, a viola and violoncello tremolo, all of great mystery and expectation, make way for a resounding finale marcato.

Composed by Antonin Dvorak (1841-1904). Henle Music Folios. Classical. G. Henle #HN1352. Published by G. Henle (HL.51481352).

Composed by Antonin Dvorak (1841-1904). Henle Study Scores. Study score (paperbound). 56 pages. G. Henle #HN7352. Published by G. Henle (HL.51487352).