Description
arianti (Variants) for flute, clarinet, and piano was commissioned by Bryn Mawr College and the Dreyfus Foundation and completed in 1982. The work falls into seven brief variations. After a short, energetic opening, the flute and clarinet meet on a unison F that serves as a bridge to the first variation. Starting with a narrow range of notes, the variation gradually expands in flute and piano registers, leading into the second variation, made up largely of a quiet interplay of notes among the trio. As the piano part fades, the flute rises lyrically to launch the third variation. Fast cross rhythms between flute and piano frame a clarinet solo. The rising theme, now exclusively in the piano, recurs in several guises before leading into the fourth variation. Here the piano plays fragmented motives in the upper register while the flute and clarinet repeat a five-note rhythm, with the flute gradually slowing down while the clarinet remains constant. The fifth variation begins forte, with A-flat and G in unison. These two notes are softly spun into fast sixteenth-note patterns, and these in turn fracture into a forte passage using the extreme registers of all the instruments, before the three musicians meet again on the variation?s opening two-note motive. An impassioned flute melody opens the sixth variation. As the flute grows softer, the piano continues to pound out a chord in eighth-note bursts, recalling the opening of the piece. The same unison F that heralded the first variation now ushers in the final, seventh variation. Marked ?serene,? the piano plays bell-like chords as the flute and clarinet play a quiet melody, mostly in octaves. The clarinet has a final, brief reminiscence of the work?s main motive as the music fades away.
Author: Steven Stucky
Instrument: Piano, Flute, Clarinet
Medium: Set of Score and Parts
SKU: FSH-144-40173
