Four Moments for solo clarinet

Abstract

Being a clarinet player and teacher, I have loved my interactions over the years with the Stravinsky Three Pieces, Sutermeister's Capriccio, Widmann's Fantasie, Martino's A Set for the clarinet and of course, William O Smith's fabulous Five Pieces for clarinet alone, amongst many other pieces and always felt enticed by the challenge of writing something for a solo clarinet, where the whole musical impact was drawn out of a single line wind instrument. Stravinsky nailed it of course, as did Britten for the oboe and Debussy for the flute, and with those three legends looking over my shoulder, the chances of success for a piece from my humble hands seemed unlikely. Maybe it was this weight that has made me wait until I was in my 50s before I attempted it. In the end, it was my interaction with my young student Drew Gilchrist that got me writing. I had met Drew in Coffs Harbour thanks to my partner Trish O'Brien who had been mentoring him at the regional Conservatorium there for a few months before I arrived to do a concert with her. I was totally struck by Drew's talent and skill from the first lesson. Fast forward a few years and I had been teaching him every couple of weeks or so by then, Drew asked me about his program for his HSC recital. It had a very tight time limit and also needed a piece written in the last 25 years. I casually said that I would write him a piece that would fit the bill for what he needed. I had a dream about the piece starting with a tone row. Must have had something about a discussion I was having with Trish about Alex Ross's book The Rest is Noise. So it started with a tone row and the whole first movement was based on that and its inherent variations, retrograde and inversions etc. And the truth is, that I had a lot of fun writing the first movement. The second and fourth moments were studies for my clarinet concerto cadenza, and the third was the first thing i wrote following the death of my mother, hence the rather sombre nature.