Copyright (c) 2012 All rights reserved. http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart Recent documents in Gary Smart en-us Sat, 24 Nov 2012 05:18:56 PST 3600 http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/32 http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/32 Wed, 15 Jun 2011 13:36:05 PDT “Benediction” for solo violin (2009) was written for violinist Piotr Szlewczyk and his recording project “Violin Futura”. This short set of variations is based on the old southern hymn, “Part in Peace”.

]]> Gary Smart Scores http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/31 http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/31 Wed, 15 Jun 2011 13:36:03 PDT This piece was originally recorded for Capstone Records in 1990. At the time, this beautiful bird was disappearing from the American West and was on the endangered species list.

The piece is in two movements. The first is “nesting music”, the second takes flight, and moves through several adventurous episodes, but finally settles back into the opening serenity. The work ends with echoing calls fading into silence.

]]> Gary Smart Scores http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/30 http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/30 Wed, 15 Jun 2011 13:36:01 PDT An example of my electronic music. Taken from a collection called "Five Electronic Preludes".

]]> Gary Smart Performances http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/29 http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/29 Wed, 15 Jun 2011 13:35:59 PDT An example of my electronic music. Taken from a collection called "Five Electronic Preludes".

]]> Gary Smart Performances http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/28 http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/28 Wed, 15 Jun 2011 13:35:56 PDT "Del Diario de un Papagayo" [From the Diary of a Parrot] is a recording of the premiere of this work for chamber orchestra and tape recorded parrot. It was composed and premiered in 1973 by the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra. The 'soloist' was our family parrot, Pablo.

]]> Gary Smart et al. Performances http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/27 http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/27 Wed, 15 Jun 2011 13:35:55 PDT “Benediction” for solo violin (2009) was written for violinist Piotr Szlewczyk and his recording project “Violin Futura”. This short set of variations is based on the old southern hymn, “Part in Peace”.

]]> Piotr Szlewczyk et al. Performances http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/26 http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/26 Wed, 15 Jun 2011 13:35:53 PDT This piece was originally recorded for Capstone Records in 1990 by Britt Theurer on trumpet and The Franciscan String Quartet. At the time, this beautiful bird was disappearing from the American West and was on the endangered species list.

The piece is in two movements. The first is “nesting music”, the second takes flight, and moves through several adventurous episodes, but finally settles back into the opening serenity. The work ends with echoing calls fading into silence.

]]> Britt Theurer et al. Performances http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/25 http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/25 Mon, 13 Jun 2011 13:29:10 PDT This group of short pieces for two pianists playing one piano was composed for a tour of central Japan in the summer of 2006. At a concert in Kyoto I premiered this collection, as secundo pianist, with six of my former Japanese piano students, each playing one movement with me. Each movement is dedicated to that individual and I like to think that these movements reflect, to some extent, each pianists’ personality.

The title “Beatbox” refers to the repetitive rhythmic motives which serve as the basis for each movement. This music features energetic ostinati, and thick, bopish textures. Movement five is the exception. Here a serene Coplandesque quality creates a melodic, harmonic pause in all the hectic activity.

]]> Gary Smart Scores http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/24 http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/24 Mon, 13 Jun 2011 13:29:06 PDT This group of short pieces for two pianists playing one piano was composed for a tour of central Japan in the summer of 2006. At a concert in Kyoto I premiered this collection, as secundo pianist, with six of my former Japanese piano students, each playing one movement with me. Each movement is dedicated to that individual and I like to think that these movements reflect, to some extent, each pianists’ personality.

The title “Beatbox” refers to the repetitive rhythmic motives which serve as the basis for each movement. This music features energetic ostinati, and thick, bopish textures. Movement five is the exception. Here a serene Coplandesque quality creates a melodic, harmonic pause in all the hectic activity.

]]> Gary Smart et al. Performances http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/23 http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/23 Mon, 13 Jun 2011 13:29:01 PDT This group of short pieces for two pianists playing one piano was composed for a tour of central Japan in the summer of 2006. At a concert in Kyoto I premiered this collection, as secundo pianist, with six of my former Japanese piano students, each playing one movement with me. Each movement is dedicated to that individual and I like to think that these movements reflect, to some extent, each pianists’ personality.

The title “Beatbox” refers to the repetitive rhythmic motives which serve as the basis for each movement. This music features energetic ostinati, and thick, bopish textures. Movement five is the exception. Here a serene Coplandesque quality creates a melodic, harmonic pause in all the hectic activity.

]]> Gary Smart et al. Performances http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/22 http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/22 Mon, 13 Jun 2011 13:28:56 PDT This group of short pieces for two pianists playing one piano was composed for a tour of central Japan in the summer of 2006. At a concert in Kyoto I premiered this collection, as secundo pianist, with six of my former Japanese piano students, each playing one movement with me. Each movement is dedicated to that individual and I like to think that these movements reflect, to some extent, each pianists’ personality.

The title “Beatbox” refers to the repetitive rhythmic motives which serve as the basis for each movement. This music features energetic ostinati, and thick, bopish textures. Movement five is the exception. Here a serene Coplandesque quality creates a melodic, harmonic pause in all the hectic activity.

]]> Gary Smart et al. Performances http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/21 http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/21 Mon, 13 Jun 2011 13:28:51 PDT This group of short pieces for two pianists playing one piano was composed for a tour of central Japan in the summer of 2006. At a concert in Kyoto I premiered this collection, as secundo pianist, with six of my former Japanese piano students, each playing one movement with me. Each movement is dedicated to that individual and I like to think that these movements reflect, to some extent, each pianists’ personality.

The title “Beatbox” refers to the repetitive rhythmic motives which serve as the basis for each movement. This music features energetic ostinati, and thick, bopish textures. Movement five is the exception. Here a serene Coplandesque quality creates a melodic, harmonic pause in all the hectic activity.

]]> Gary Smart et al. Performances http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/20 http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/20 Mon, 13 Jun 2011 13:28:46 PDT This group of short pieces for two pianists playing one piano was composed for a tour of central Japan in the summer of 2006. At a concert in Kyoto I premiered this collection, as secundo pianist, with six of my former Japanese piano students, each playing one movement with me. Each movement is dedicated to that individual and I like to think that these movements reflect, to some extent, each pianists’ personality.

The title “Beatbox” refers to the repetitive rhythmic motives which serve as the basis for each movement. This music features energetic ostinati, and thick, bopish textures. Movement five is the exception. Here a serene Coplandesque quality creates a melodic, harmonic pause in all the hectic activity.

]]> Gary Smart et al. Performances http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/19 http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/19 Mon, 13 Jun 2011 13:28:42 PDT This group of short pieces for two pianists playing one piano was composed for a tour of central Japan in the summer of 2006. At a concert in Kyoto I premiered this collection, as secundo pianist, with six of my former Japanese piano students, each playing one movement with me. Each movement is dedicated to that individual and I like to think that these movements reflect, to some extent, each pianists’ personality.

The title “Beatbox” refers to the repetitive rhythmic motives which serve as the basis for each movement. This music features energetic ostinati, and thick, bopish textures. Movement five is the exception. Here a serene Coplandesque quality creates a melodic, harmonic pause in all the hectic activity.

]]> Gary Smart et al. Performances http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/18 http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/18 Fri, 10 Jun 2011 12:13:51 PDT “Bye-bye” for mixed sextet of instruments was written specifically for the 2010 Finale Composers’ Competition. It was finished in August 2010. It is a kind of abstract toccata which relies on rhythmic gestures as a primary unifying device. “Bye-bye” is Ivesian in it’s overall American character and in it’s use of materials from diverse musical genres (vaudeville, ragtime, waltz, early jazz, swing, etc.).

Only five minutes in length, this piece is written to serve as a brilliant, eccentric showpiece encore. Fans of the “Great American songbook” will recognize this music to be a free fantasy on the old sing-a-long favorite – “Bye Bye Blackbird” (1926).

]]> Gary Smart Scores http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/17 http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/17 Fri, 10 Jun 2011 12:13:49 PDT “Bye-bye” for mixed sextet of instruments was written specifically for the 2010 Finale Composers’ Competition. It was finished in August 2010. It is a kind of abstract toccata which relies on rhythmic gestures as a primary unifying device. “Bye-bye” is Ivesian in it’s overall American character and in it’s use of materials from diverse musical genres (vaudeville, ragtime, waltz, early jazz, swing, etc.).

Only five minutes in length, this piece is written to serve as a brilliant, eccentric showpiece encore. Fans of the “Great American songbook” will recognize this music to be a free fantasy on the old sing-a-long favorite – “Bye Bye Blackbird” (1926).

]]> Gary Smart et al. Performances http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/16 http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/16 Fri, 10 Jun 2011 11:16:36 PDT Wabi Sabi is a fantasy for eight instruments: flute, oboe, clarinet, bassoon, violin, viola, cello and bass. The title, a Japanese phrase, refers to a love and nostalgia for ancient times, for old 
things - antiques - things which evoke feelings of purity, nobility, hard won wisdom, an essential spirituality, true worth. A tea ceremony in a Kyoto garden is “wabi sabi”. The piece was formed intuitively as a kind of drama, perhaps a Japanese folk tale. The expansion of “time perception”, the savoring of sound colors and the evocation of mood is central to the aesthetic of this music.

]]> Gary Smart Scores http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/15 http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/15 Fri, 10 Jun 2011 11:16:34 PDT Wabi Sabi is a fantasy for eight instruments: flute, oboe, clarinet, bassoon, violin, viola, cello and bass. The title, a Japanese phrase, refers to a love and nostalgia for ancient times, for old 
things - antiques - things which evoke feelings of purity, nobility, hard won wisdom, an essential spirituality, true worth. A tea ceremony in a Kyoto garden is “wabi sabi”. The piece was formed intuitively as a kind of drama, perhaps a Japanese folk tale. The expansion of “time perception”, the savoring of sound colors and the evocation of mood is central to the aesthetic of this music.

]]> Gary Smart et al. Performances http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/14 http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/14 Fri, 10 Jun 2011 10:38:07 PDT “Song of the Holy Ground” for piano and string quartet was written in reaction to an Apache chant recorded in 1953 by musicologist John Donald Robb. The original recording, sung by a young girl, is clear, delicate and charming at first hearing. The text itself is unknown to me, beyond the fact that this is a song of consecration, a blessing. But the music of the chant is enchanting, with its uniquely expressive melodic shapes and its asymmetrical rhythms.

In approaching this material I first made a detailed transcription of the chant and became fascinated with the intricacy of the motivic and rhythmic repetition which creates a simple, but unified musical format – basically A1A2A3A4/B1B2B3B4.

My composition is a fantasy, an abstracted music that at times 1) spins out a music which freely develops small pitch or rhythmic motives taken from the original chant and at times 2) directly “sets” a statement of the chant – as with the solo violin statement at the very closing of the work. My quintet is not to be taken in any way as a decorated version of the original chant, nor is it in any sense an attempt to improve upon it. First of all “Song of the Holy Ground” is an act of artistic homage.

]]> Gary Smart Scores http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/13 http://works.bepress.com/gary_smart/13 Fri, 10 Jun 2011 10:38:05 PDT “Song of the Holy Ground” for piano and string quartet was written in reaction to an Apache chant recorded in 1953 by musicologist John Donald Robb. The original recording, sung by a young girl, is clear, delicate and charming at first hearing. The text itself is unknown to me, beyond the fact that this is a song of consecration, a blessing. But the music of the chant is enchanting, with its uniquely expressive melodic shapes and its asymmetrical rhythms.

In approaching this material I first made a detailed transcription of the chant and became fascinated with the intricacy of the motivic and rhythmic repetition which creates a simple, but unified musical format – basically A1A2A3A4/B1B2B3B4.

My composition is a fantasy, an abstracted music that at times 1) spins out a music which freely develops small pitch or rhythmic motives taken from the original chant and at times 2) directly “sets” a statement of the chant – as with the solo violin statement at the very closing of the work. My quintet is not to be taken in any way as a decorated version of the original chant, nor is it in any sense an attempt to improve upon it. First of all “Song of the Holy Ground” is an act of artistic homage.

]]> Gary Smart et al. Performances