PROGRAM NOTE
Birds of Paradise for flute and piano (2013) intersperses music that is brilliant and energetic with the wondrous and songful. Its title notwithstanding, I did not set out to compose a “bird” piece — Messiaen’s music, which I admire immensely, would seem to render such an effort quite unnecessary. The title does allude, however, to the musical imagery that the music, as I was composing it, was evoking in my own mind, where shifting motion and brilliant color, as well as passionate song, take center-stage.
The work is structured in three movement-like sections that are played without breaks and that form a large fast-slow-fast shape, more an A-B-C than true arch form, internally shaped in ways that allow for numerous detours into further contrasting terrains. As the piece progresses, though, several main ideas that emerge early on become dominant, helping tie together the various digressions and flights of fancy.
The flute writing makes occasional use of extended flute techniques such as tongue rams, key clicks, and more, which for me are not so much “sound effects” but rather a natural extension of the instrument’s sound palette, which I use also as one of the ways in which some thematic materials and their elaborations in this work can be defined.
Played without break:
1) Sparkling and energetic
2) With mystery and awe
3) Brilliant, articulate, propulsive
—Shulamit Ran
A more extended program note appears as part of the published music.
INFORMATION
Chicago Flute Club 25th Anniversary Commission
Premiere: August 10, 2014
National Flute Association annual convention, Chicago, IL
Mary Stolper, flute and Kuang-Hao Huang, piano
Duration: c. 12’
Recordings
Sarah Frisof, flute, Daniel Pesca, piano: Beauty Crying Forth, Flute Music by Women Across Time,
Furious Artisans FACD6826
Jennie Oh Brown, flute, Carter Pann, piano: Giantess, Innova 043
SHEET MUSIC
Available from your favorite sheet music seller, or directly from Theodore Presser.