Warren Park Music Home

Four special pieces to listen to:
1)	*From Lydia for trumpet and piano* This recording is the full-length original version of From Lydia, now revised and shortened for flute and piano, and available within the Music for Small Ensembles section of the Compositions button. This recording, with fine performers and recording equipment, gives listeners a real virtuosic ride through some very challenging territory. This recording was made decades ago during a professional recording session, with no audience, all in one take. It is not flawless, but it shows some real spirit. It displays the original extended version of this piece. Some of these fascinating sections were removed for the flute and piano version now available. (21.46)
2)	Video: Spirit Waltz and Art Works This is a bit of a leap for me, combining a 2-and-a-half minute piece of music of mine with a series of 17 art works I drew with gel pens and acrylics over the last couple of years. I try to align the character of each picture with a moment in the music that seems to match. Spirit Waltz is one of the six sections of Slipstream, my composition for big band. The rest can be heard here on my website, within the Music for Small Ensembles section. (2:33)
3)	*Natural Powderhorn Park* This short video (4:25) consists of a collage of photos I have taken of the natural side of Powderhorn Park over the years. The music that accompanies the photos is my composition named Weave a Gossamer Web, based on an animation I hope will be created in the future. The idea, which you are welcome to imagine as the music flows by, is this: four spiders of different sizes and colors magically collaborate on a unified web that covers a large space among tree branches, using a variety of colors which blend together to form a sheet of frail, wispy gossamer fabric. Any collaborators available?
4)	*Fantasia for Seven Players* This is actually a piece written in 1978, and recorded at a public performance by capable musicians as part of a West Bank School of Music concert. It is a live recording, complete with the coughs from the audience, some missed notes, a few spots where the players are a little out of synch, and the noise of a trombone mute falling to the floor. Fantasia was written specially as a companion, 'warm-up' piece for Stravinsky's Soldier's Tale, using the same exact instrumentation: violin, double bass, trumpet, trombone, clarinet, bassoon and percussion. The performance is exciting and enthusiastic, even with its flaws. This recording was recently retrieved from an old reel-to-reel recording made in 1978. This composition is being revised and soon will be available in print quality score and parts. (11:33)