Quiz: Mystery scores

[listener]

No, but that sounds fun - do you have a score of it?

No, just a recording  Philip Martin playing Reizenstein on Continuum CCD 1007.
Another set of variations is Rubinstein's op. 93 on 'Yankee Doodle' which might amuse you.

[Dax]

16 - An exquisitely beautiful piece of dodecaphony by  famously irrascible British composer with an even more famous father. The date and text are enough to get this one, I think.

Elisabeth Lutyens?

[Luke]

Yes indeed it is. Listened to And suddenly it's evening in the car this morning. Wow. That was the first piece of 12-tone I fell in love with as a lad and it still works

[(poco) Sforzando]

Yes indeed it is. Listened to And suddenly it's evening in the car this morning. Wow. That was the first piece of 12-tone I fell in love with as a lad and it still works

Guess I'm not up on my irascible British composers. What of hers should I hear?

[Luke]

Yes, well, that's just typical of you, you....

No, can't do it, can't do irascible even as a joke. It's bad enough having to do British...

To answer your question, you should hear the piece I've set, so someone should identify it. It ought to be pretty easy at this point. She can be tumultuously complicated, but in pieces like this the construction is as clear, exquisite and instantly-audible as e.g. the Webern Symphony (if anything, more so). It is a very moving work indeed, I think

[Karl Henning]

I'm only passably irascible.

[Luke]

Another set of variations is Rubinstein's op. 93 on 'Yankee Doodle' which might amuse you.

Just checked the score to that - looks fun! Thanks!

Re the set of Variations I set - I realised the other day that one of them, later than the page I've given, is aping figuration in one of Mendelssohn's variation sets. Just to make a connection with the Wizard-of-Oz-plagiarising-Mendelssohn Larry noted a few pages ago...

[EigenUser]

No, but that looks like Feldman's Cello and Orchestra (I think that was one of our mystery scores years and years ago, too, set possibly by Guido, or maybe by me...)

Correct.

Here's an interesting piece that my friend told me about recently:

#25

[Luke]

That's Rzewski's Winnsboro Cotton Mill Blues. Was just thinking about this piece the other day, with the purpose of using it as an example in class for my students. It's an astonishingly realistic portrayal of the machine, but it's more than that, it's a piece with a powerful moral tone, too..

[EigenUser]

Two more:
#26


#27

[Luke]

The bottom one certainly looks like Stockhausen in both handwriting and content, and is reminiscent of Mantra in both of these ways too, so possibly from the same sort of time period i.e. 1970s. But I'm not sure exactly what it is yet...

[listener]

My last one, 13-8 will lose some relevance in a couple of days, its brilliance may help identify the composer to some measure

[EigenUser]

The bottom one certainly looks like Stockhausen in both handwriting and content, and is reminiscent of Mantra in both of these ways too, so possibly from the same sort of time period i.e. 1970s. But I'm not sure exactly what it is yet...

It is Stockhausen (who else would have a tempo of q=113.5?!), but it is not from the 1970s.

Ideas for the top one?

EDIT: Here is one more. A little project of mine, but I'm sure it is still recognizable.

[Ken B]

It is Stockhausen (who else would have a tempo of q=113.5?!), but it is not from the 1970s.

Ideas for the top one?

EDIT: Here is one more. A little project of mine, but I'm sure it is still recognizable.

I gotta say, every time I visit this thread I am amazed at how good Luke is at this.

[Karl Henning]

I gotta say, every time I visit this thread I am amazed at how good Luke is at this.

He's the sharpest of us!

[Luke]

That last one - are you orchestrating the Vingt Regards?

[Luke]

(Regard de l'esprit de joie)

Cool project! 

[EigenUser]

That last one - are you orchestrating the Vingt Regards?

Yup -- just the 10th one for now. For a huge orchestra (though, I realized that I should have four trombones instead of five -- that's a mistake on this page I need to fix). Not sure if I'll finish, but I'd like to. I started out doing it just as an exercise with no intention of completing it, but it is so much fun to orchestrate. Kind of tedious to assign time signatures, but it's not too big of a deal.

I'm trying to keep Messiaen's style as much as I can, though I'm not sure how successful it will turn out to be. Lots of metal percussion/gamelan sounds and what I call Messiaen's "rhythmic games" in the percussion. For instance -- chromatic durations, rhythms superimposed with themselves at different tempos*, etc. At one point (not on this page) I even got carried away and did an decreasing Fibonacci sequence (8-5-3-2-1-1) in the Chinese cymbal together (superimposed) with an increasing Fibonacci sequence in the maracas (1-1-2-3-5-8)

Sorry for the long post -- it's just nice to tell an actual musician what I'm trying to do (I try to tell my mom, bless her, and she's like "Oh, that's nice dear.").

*see m. 108 -- woodblock and maracas have same rhythm (that of the "Theme de Dieu"), but the woodblock has it at half-tempo.

[Luke]

Oh, that's nice dear....




only kidding! Those percussion parts certainly look right, and the increasing/decreasing patterns are typical too. Howabout the 'personages rhythmiques' - one rhythm grows, one diminishes, one stays the same. That's a fun one to manipulate, too. Messiaen's list of rhythmic games is extensive, as you know!

[EigenUser]

Oh, that's nice dear....




only kidding! Those percussion parts certainly look right, and the increasing/decreasing patterns are typical too. Howabout the 'personages rhythmiques' - one rhythm grows, one diminishes, one stays the same. That's a fun one to manipulate, too. Messiaen's list of rhythmic games is extensive, as you know!

That's a good idea. I'll look at that tomorrow morning! He does something like that in the 3rd movement of the TS with the woodblock, maracas, and bass drum.