Chamber Music Clarinet, Piano, Violin

SKU: PR.164002390

Composed by Dan Welcher. Set of Score and Parts. With Standard notation. Composed 1995. 26+14+14 pages. Duration 14 minutes. Theodore Presser Company #164-00239. Published by Theodore Presser Company (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.

Chamber Music violin, piano

SKU: PR.144407050

Composed by James Primosch. Set of Score and Parts. With Standard notation. 28+12 pages. Duration 20 minutes. Theodore Presser Company #144-40705. Published by Theodore Presser Company (PR.144407050).

UPC: 680160655519. 9 x 12 inches.

Celebrating 30 years, the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society commissioned a work of 20-25 minutes for violin and piano from James Primosch, University of Pennsylvania professor of music. Primosch had originally thought to create a new sonata, but what developed is more appropriately a set of five character pieces, two of which were directly inspired by poems. Five Poems was premiered in May, 2016, and Primosch's thoughts are recorded at his website: https://jamesprimosch.com /2016/05/10/five-poems-pr emiere/.
Upon receiving a commission from the Philadelphia Chamber MusicSociety for a violin and piano piece in honor of its 30th anniversary, myplan was to write a sonata, a term suggesting a relatively abstractdiscourse. But as the piece developed, the movements struck me ascharacter pieces rather than music employing a more “symphonic”ap proach. When specific poems started to attach themselves in my mindwith two of the movements, the overall title Five Poems became clear.The title of the second movement is a line from Susan Stewart’s“De scent”, which deals with Aeneas’s visit to the underworld. The musicis alternately fiercely driving and quite still, though tense. RobertFrost’s Nothing Gold Can Stay summons fleet scale passages framinglyrical counterpoint. The remaining movements do not refer to specificpoems, but have titles reflecting their expressive tone. Dreamscape ismusing with an improvisatory violin line over shifting pairs of pianochords. Nightsong is a bluesy lullaby that turns highly dramatic.Vision begins with a closely argued struggle but breaks through tosomething spacious and clear.

Chamber Music Cello, Clarinet, Flute, Piano, Violin

SKU: PR.14440516S

Composed by Robert Martin. Full score. With Standard notation. 44 pages. Duration 9 minutes, 15 seconds. Theodore Presser Company #144-40516S. Published by Theodore Presser Company (PR.14440516S).

UPC: 680160667864. 9 x 12 inches.

In 1979, Martin produced a set of three quintets, in consideration of Gorky's piece Nighttime Enigma Nostalgia. Each is scored for flute, clarinet, violin, cello, and piano. As the title suggests, the music is in a state of perpetual questioning using a variety of approaches. For example, Enigma opens using ostinati (plural of ostinato) that do not match in length, like a staircase with each step a different height. Additionally, the music has sudden starts and stops, again unexplained. There are dramatic and powerful explosive passages that are interrupted. The technique, used to create this feeling of a perplexed music world where things seem often not to make sense and to be left unresolved, is called in poetry and literature, anticlimax. In Enigma, the music suggests one direction; then refuses to continue, striking out in another direction. Artists use approaches such as this to force themselves into creative circumstances that they otherwise might not have discovered. (From the performance notes.).

Violin and piano - difficult

SKU: HL.49017922

Composed by John Casken. This edition: Saddle stitching. Sheet music. String. Score and parts. Composed 2006. 40 pages. Duration 16'. Schott Music #ED13084. Published by Schott Music (HL.49017922).

ISBN 9790220127397. UPC: 884088567620. 9.0x12.0x0.125 inches.

These six short pieces might more readily be described as fantasies, each with its own sound-world but linked by shared material. The mood of each of these short movements is guided by an imaginary landscape, one shadowed by the blackened tree, a far-away song, shadows past, a quickening moon, forgotten voices, and by the harrowed land. The title of the last movement plays on the word harrow, something that is used to break up the soil, but also bringing with it suggestions of a land both pained and wounded.

Hymns to the Creator: Two Arrangements for Violin and Piano by Duane Funderburk. For piano, violin. General. Moderately Difficult. Piano score and reproducible parts. Published by MorningStar Music Publishers

Piano Accompaniment; Violin (Score and Solo Part) - difficult

SKU: HL.49044450

Violin and Piano. Composed by Thierry Pé and cou. This edition: Saddle stitching. Sheet music. String. Soleil-Feu refers to the first attempt to create a world out of a rain of fire (nahui quiahuitl) as described in the cosmogony of Ancient Mexican civilisation. The element of fire is reflected in the musical soundscape of this work; rampant, rhythmic moti. Classical, Contemporary. Softcover. Composed 2013. 32 pages. Duration 6'. Schott Music #ED21888. Published by Schott Music (HL.49044450).

ISBN 9790001198639. 9.0x12.0x0.124 inches.

This work is part of a cycle of five short pieces for a single instrument and piano, focused on the five ages in the cosmogony of Ancient Mexican civilisation. The peoples of the Mexican highlands believe that time follows specific cycles and that the world was created following the pattern of 'trial and error'. The creation of the world is divided into several periods which are termed 'suns' (we are currently living in the fifth phase named 'Ollin'). Each period will be brought to an end through a natural catastrophe.Solei-Feu refers to the first attempt to create a world out of a rain of fire (nahui quiahuitl).The element of fire is reflected in the musical soundscape of this work, constructed from rampant, rhythmic motifs, fragmented splinters, spinning upswings and impacts reverberating through space. An intimate dialogue develops between violin and piano on the basis of extremely simple figures. Interconnecting lines and dense musical material are thrown against each other in a play of contrasting registers and blended tonal colouring, creating a mysterious and disturbing mythological universe coloured by its ontological pessimism. Thierry Pecou

Soleil-Feu refers to the first attempt to create a world out of a rain of fire (nahui quiahuitl) as described in the cosmogony of Ancient Mexican civilisation. The element of fire is reflected in the musical soundscape of this work; rampant, rhythmic motifs, fragmented splinters, spinning upswings and impacts reverberating through space create a mysterious and disturbing mythological universe coloured by its ontological pessimism. Thierry Pecou.

Op. 31a. Composed by Oliver Knussen (1952-). Solo; Solo Small Ensembles; String - Violin and Piano. Faber Edition. 20th Century. Part(s); Score. Faber Music #12-0571520561. Published by Faber Music