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Abstract:
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My idea in this, my first woodwind quintet, was to compose five movements or vignettes
that would feature a different instrument in each of its sections. While the five instruments
comprising a woodwind quintet blend well together, each has its own distinctive voice,
which is explored along with each instrument’s unique personality and range. It has
always intrigued me that musical instruments, perhaps especially the winds, have the
unique ability, without human voice or expression, to elicit a wide range of moods and
emotions. Humor and tragedy, darkness and light, heaviness and buoyancy, love, fear,
pathos and much more can quite readily be evoked by any of these instruments depending
upon turn of phrase, harmony, texture, dynamics, rhythm and the myriad possibilities of
the interplay between all of these elements and between the instruments themselves. The
first, third and fifth movements, featuring, respectively, flute, clarinet, and bassoon,
employ brisker tempos with more upbeat and occasionally humorous melodies while the
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second and fourth movements, featuring, respectively, the oboe and horn, contain more
reflective melodies at slower tempos. In this way do I hope to communicate, or frame, at
least some of the feelings, positive and otherwise, which we all experience at one time or
another.
Each movement has at least one small solo section for the featured instrument as a
contrast with the full ensemble sound that gets ample exposure. Major and minor
modalities are used freely and interchangeably, and while key signatures are not used,
none of the movements are atonal and all contain key centers, which serve as harmonic
anchors. One of my goals in these vignettes is to create a harmonic background that is not
entirely literal and that contains a certain element of ambiguity. This technique is, for me,
analogous to using pastels as opposed to brighter, more defined colors in a painting, and
serves as a binding agent, which unites all five movements with regard to harmonic
accompaniment.
In order to make more possible the playing of the entire quintet in one concert, I have
limited the duration of this piece; it can be performed in less than eighteen minutes. As
such, there is very little development in each vignette. Rather, I have generally
constructed for each movement an introduction, a statement of themes (usually two per
movement), connecting or transition sections, a re-statement of the primary theme and a
coda as a punctuation mark. To provide variety, each of these sections varies in length
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and the solo sections come in different places from movement to movement, at times
doubling as the introduction, at other times acting as a respite from the concerti sections. |
