Delusions of Grandeur Part Two 1977-1979

Prelude for Clarinet and Piano (1977)

3 Kelly Songs (1978)

Concerto for Piano, Flute, and Strings (1978)

2 Poems (1978)

Variations on a Theme by Brahms (1978)

Symphony (1979)

3 brothers: Paul (L) and Glen (R), your blogger seated

I wrote Prelude for Clarinet and Piano in the spring of 1977 for my brother Paul, who was at Washington State University studying clarinet. It features a three-note melodic motif (E, F, D) that I drove relentlessly (using various transpositions, transformations, permutations, and prolongations) into the ground. In 1979 he performed it on his Senior Recital and I have been told that a copy of the score resides quietly in the WSU music library. I was unable to be there, but have a recording.

In my first year at the University of Washington I met Ken Jaffe, a fellow student who commuted to school with me on the same bus. He was a counter-tenor with perfect pitch, and I wrote him three short songs on verses by Walt Kelly: "One Small Score for Two Brown Eyes," "For Lewis Carroll and the Children," and "A Summer Song to a Winter Tune." Ken and I performed them at a Student Composer Concert at the UW in May of 1979. I computer-engraved the first two of them, but apparently not the third. The complete score is probably buried deep in a drawer somewhere. Permission to use the texts was neither sought nor granted.

beard o' wisp

In order to be a famous composer pianist I needed a to compose a Piano Concerto. I was struggling considerably at the time with what is popularly known as "finding one's voice." From this end the problem is mostly one of shedding all the dreamy ideas about what kind of composer one aspires to be, but at the time it seemed mostly a question of how to put one note after another so that it sounded like music. After at least one major revision this was performed in November of 1979, featuring my friend Dean Williamson on piano, Ellen Berkowitz on flute, with the Thalia Chamber Symphony, under my baton. Much of it is rather murky, some of it is rhythmic and fun. Each soloist gets a cadenza.

2 Poems consist of an Elegy and an Epigraph for solo cello. A fellow student was kind enough to perform them at one of our weekly composer's seminars. There is a slow one and a fast one.

Each variation of my Brahms Variations focuses on a different orchestral group - strings, brass, winds, like that. The University of Washington Orchestra read through this once, doing a better job than it deserved. The Theme is a Sarabande for piano that Brahms ended up re-tooling as part of an early chamber piece - one of the piano trios if I am not, though I often am, mistaken.

with mountains and hat

I was determined to write a symphony when I was 19. I had read that Shostakovich had done so, and possibly others. Mustn't fall behind! I managed to finish the score the day before I turned 20. It has some moments, notably a fugal bit that could have gone somewhere, and a french horn tune that needed more work. There is a grand design but it hardly matters. A couple of years later the Seattle Symphony provided six of us composition students with a rehearsal and a concert of our pieces, conducted by Michel Singher. It was my senior year and I was fortunate to be included. A local television station, looking for a human interest story, sent a camera crew and reporter to interview one of us. Due to the timing of their visit (during rehearsals) I happened to be the one they interviewed, though not, as I recall, the one they had hoped to. This is the only time I have appeared on television. I surreptitiously recorded the concert, hauling a full size cassette deck up to the balcony in a suitcase. Very sneaky.