Saturday 14 September 2024
from “Progress in Flute Playing”
Here is another étude from the first book of Ernesto Köhler's Progress in Flute Playing. This triple-meter piece makes heavy use of articulation. It is marked martellato, which translates literally from Italian as ‛hammered’, thus calling for very strong accents.
Friday 13 September 2024
from Flute Sonata No. 11
This Allegro is the second movement of a sonata in B-flat major for two flutes by the German Baroque composer and music theorist Johann Mattheson. It was published in Amsterdam in 1708.
Thursday 12 September 2024
from Alessandro Marcello's Oboe Concerto in D minor
Alessandro Marcello was a Venetian nobleman who excelled in various areas, including poetry, philosophy, mathematics and, most notably, music. This concerto he wrote in D minor for oboe, strings and basso continuo is perhaps his best-known work. Its worth was attested to by Johann Sebastian Bach, who transcribed it for harpsichord (BWV 974).
The central movement, in particular, is a deeply-felt adagio which aspires to genuine pathos. As such, it has been used effectively in many movies, like The Hunger (with David Bowie and Susan Sarandon), The Firm (with Tom Cruise and Gene Hackman) or the more recent The House of Mirth.
Wednesday 11 September 2024
Traditional Irish jig
This Irish jig is taken from Francis O'Neill's celebrated collection Music of Ireland, published in Chicago in 1903.
The term ‛fardown’ was used in the 19th and 20th centuries, often by Irish-Americans, to describe someone from Ulster, the northernmost province of Ireland.
Tuesday 10 September 2024
from “A Theoretical and Practical Essay on the Boehm Flute”
Today we propose a little study by British flutist and composer John Clinton. It was first published in London in 1843, as part of his A Theoretical and Practical Essay on the Boehm Flute.
Monday 9 September 2024
from “Three German Dances”, K. 605 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
This little piece, whose German name “Die Schlittenfahrt” means “The Sleigh Ride”, is one of the most popular of Mozart's numerous orchestral dances. Written near the end of his life, it is, like many of the composer's other “German dances”, a Ländler, a simple dance in triple meter that was the predecessor to the waltz. Its most unusual feature, and the one that inspired its nickname, is its original scoring: in addition to a small orchestra of two violins, bass, two flutes, two oboes, two horns, and timpani, it calls for two posthorns and five sleighbells that bounce along on each beat.
Sunday 8 September 2024
from Flute Sonata in B minor
This is the fourth and final movement of the third of the six Op. 7 flute sonatas with bass accompaniment by French flutist and composer Jean-Daniel Braun, published in Paris in 1736.