Informationen zu "John Alexander khroma zones Double Bass & Piano"
Verlag: Recital Music
Verlagsnummer: RM662
EAN: 9790570456628
ISMN: M-57045-662-8
Beschreibung
John Alexander writes: 'khroma zones ? seven pieces for double bass and piano
? is a colourful collection of small compositions, each depicting some aspect
of my mother's life. Also, apropos the overall title, her initials were Mrs
DNA. Like me, my dad always enjoyed a pun. My mother thought that we were
both daft. She was probably right. 1 yellow duster We had a central
strip of hardwaring carpet on our staircase at my childhood home, leaving a
stained, polished and exposed square of timber tread each side. One of the
daily chores my mother had designated to me was to take a yellow duster from
the drawer and dust these little squares, after breakfast and before school.
There were 13 treads (26 squares) and I used to carry out this task with
speedy gusto, trying to be faster than I had been the previous day. 2
rhode island red There was a long chicken run at the bottom of our garden.
The hen house was on the extreme left hand side and in the morning the hens
would gradually process down their ribbed ramp to scratch and forage. Mum
showed me how to collect the eggs, mix feed, water the birds. As a lad it
intrigued me that a hen's quiet clucking and walking rhythms were mostly
irregular. It also amused me that a chicken may suddenly run madly about,
squawking freely, coming to a halt almost as unexpectedly as it began. 3
a flutter on the grey My mother was never a gambler, but she enjoyed a
small each way flutter on annual classic races like the Grand National, Derby
or Oaks. She always favoured any grey horse that was running ? it clearly
stood out from the rest ? but her bets rarely won her anything. 4 comfy
green settee Mum was a great one for knitting: lots of booties, shawls and
coats for babies, cardigans for her or my sister, fair isle tank tops or
cable stitch pullovers for my dad and me. But these articles required wool
and, in those days, it came in long skeins. My mother and I would sit
comfortably on the settee, me with my hands held out in front, thumbs
sticking up. She would then place the end loops of the skein over my
extended fingers and begin winding in, forming the required ball of wool. 5
floral blue frock Dancing was a joy for my mother when she was younger,
and I can remember her and my father sometimes going to dances with friends.
Did she wear a floral blue frock to any of them? Well, she had such a dress
in her final years, and I imagine her in it, dancing with my dad, she looking
happy, he full of fun. 6 pinks with african violets Among the many
flowers that she admired, mum particularly loved the mini-carnation-like pink
and the deep purple of african violets. The former lined the pathway to the
front door, a pot of the latter always sat on the sideboard. 7 black
cherry Strings full of fat juicy black cherries were undoubtedly mum's
favourite fruit in the summer months. (She also enjoyed a quiet cherry
brandy, but that's another story.) When she was dying in hospital, I noticed
that my mother hadn't eaten anything for 20 hours or so. I asked if she
fancied a yoghurt and went and bought her one. On the lid it said, 'black
cherry'. After I had gently fed this to her, she licked her lips, and
gratefully smiled. She was 85. It was my 58th birthday. Originally, I wrote
this little piece as a piano solo and I performed it at her funeral. It was
the progenitor of all the other pieces in this set. khroma zones was
premiered at Wells Cathedral School (Somerset, UK) on 30 September 2007 by
David Heyes (double bass) and Mark Cracknell (piano), as part of the 2007
Wells Double B@ss Weekend.
______________________________________________________________________________
__ John Alexander was born in West Sussex in 1942 and began to compose at
the age of 20. At the time he discovered a fascination for art, literature,
dance, architecture and sculpture and these topics, along with mathematics,
have continued to have a bearing on his work. He studied composition with
Edmund Rubbra at the Guildhall School of Music in London, and later with
Jonathan Harvey and Peter Wiegold at the University of Sussex. John
Alexander has never been a prolific composer, but an impressive and growing
body of work reflects a rare eye for detail and structure - each work
beautifully crafted and reworked until every inflection, detail and nuance is
perfect. Probably best described as a miniaturist, he writes in a fluent,
independent and strongly personal style with an intense desire to create
music which communicates to both performer and audience alike. In 1999 John
Alexander won the 1st BIBF Composition Contest and was invited to be a judge
for several BIBF competitions. He was a featured composer at Bass-Fest 2001,
was an spnm short-listed composer for three years, and was
Composer-in-residence at the 2004 Rotterdam Conservatoire Double Bass
Weekend, Bass-Fest 2006 and 2007 Wells Double Bass Weekend. His works have
been performed and broadcast throughout the world and he was written an
impressive and unique body of work for double bass.
