Performed by Continuum Sax
Performed by the Aurelia Saxophone Quartet
The Abundant Air: Concerto for Saxophone Quartet and Band (2003)
Dedicatees: West Point Saxophone Quartet, U.S. Military Academy Band, Col. Thomas Rotondi, Jr.
Premiere: West Point Saxophone Quartet, U.S. Military Academy Band, Col. Thomas Rotondi, Jr. United States Military Academy, West Point, Eisenhower Hall, April 16, 2004
Download the PDF score sample (first 48 pages)
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Performed by Kenneth Tse and the Escher String Quartet.
The Saxophone Part is also available separately.
Program note:
Quintet for Alto Saxophone and String Quartet (2006) features three movements of wildly different character, all influenced by quite different kinds of music. The first movement, “Bright and exuberant,” is simultaneously heroic and breezy. Undulating near-minimalist figures in the strings accompany overarching melodies played by the saxophone. The B section within this A-B-A’ form is more languid, while the outer A sections contain music that is buoyant and striving.
I think of the tune at the center of movement 2 (“Heartfelt and singing”) as an urban spiritual. Though simple, it first finds itself in a bluesy if somewhat chromatically tortured chorale-like setting. Four variations follow. The first preserves the pace of the saxophone melody in a setting of pizzicato strings and short lamenting outbursts. The second variation poses quintuplet perpetual-motion arabesques against the melody while the cello plays with and against the quintuplets in rhythmic syncopation. The third variation spins an uptempo jazz waltz out of the material while the fourth sets the tune lamentingly in surprising harmonies in the strings’ upper registers. A cadenza for the saxophone brings the movement to a somber close.
The third movement is something of a middle-eastern dance, made rhythmically jagged by the everchanging meters. Marked “Dancing, yet driving,” this movement emulates the A-B-A’ shape of the first. However, the B section and the coda recapitulate the tune of the first movement, first in a melancholy mood and then in exuberant conclusion.
Quintet for Alto Saxophone and String Quartet is dedicated to saxophonist Kenneth Tse and the Escher String Quartet.
Performed by: Cory Barnfield (alto saxophone), Krista Wallace-Baz,(piano), JJ Koh (clarinet), Scott Erickson (bassoon)
Performed by Barry Cockcroft, Joseph Lallo & Jess Voigt
Performed by Lunar Saxophone Quartet
Note by the composer:
On Song was commissioned by the Lunar Saxophone Quartet with funding from Live
Music Now/Wales and first performed by them at a concert at the Riverfront Theatre Newport on 29th October 2010 at a concert celebrating the twentieth anniversary of the work of Live Music Now in Wales.
On Song is in a single movement , marked Cantabile, and as the title suggests is predominantly lyrical in character with references to different types of songs and singing. The work is also characterised by the use of complex polyrhythms often over a 'walking' bass. The tempo is constant throughout most of the work until, at the close, a slightly faster section moves the piece on to a lively and passionate conclusion.
Lunar Saxophone have recorded On Song for Signum Records on the CD 'These Visions' SIGCD233
