Lament for a Lost Clarinet

Program Notes

One of the great joys of the clarinet is klezmer music, with its swoops and swirls and glissando squawks. Or so it was for an old friend of mine, a clarinetist. But treatment for some severe periodontal decay made it too painful for him to continue to play the clarinet. I wrote this piece as a lament for the klezmer voice he can no longer attain with his favored instrument.

Performance Notes

This piece places only modest demands on the pianist. But it contains three invitations to improvisation. There are three cadenzas, modeled more or less after the "doina," an originally Rumanian dance often used in klezmer bands to show off the improvisational skills of one of the players. I have offered written out versions of the cadenzas, but the player should feel free to compose their own, and to vary them as they see fit during performance. (Improvisation does not mean that you can't have thought ahead of time about what you might play.) The player should take what I have written out just as general guidelines and ideas to work with, and also as an indication of where each cadenza needs to start from and arrive at.

The duration of the piece is about 9 minutes.

Actual Notes

Performance: 192 bit MP3 of live performance by Sigrun Franzen (13 megs)

Sheet music: PDF of first half.

For the full sheet music, please contact the composer.

 

All content copyright © 2002 to 2006 Michael Mayerfeld Bell. All rights reserved.

Page last updated March 7, 2006