Treasures for Clarinet & Piano Charles West & Susan Grace

• 1 Sonatine - I. Allegro 03:06
• 2 Sonatine - II. Largo 04:29
• 3 Sonatine - III. Prestissimo 04:03
• 4 Petite pièce, L. 120 01:27
• 5 Erwinn 09:53
• 6 Canzonetta, Op. 19 03:23
• 7 Hillandale Waltzes 10:19
• 8 Peregi verbunk, Op. 40 04:45
• 9 No. 8, La fille aux cheveux de lin (Arr. for Clarinet & Piano) 02:36
• 10 Boucolique 06:18
• 11 Vocalise-étude en forme de habanera, M. 51 02:56
• Total Runtime 53:15

Info zu Treasures for Clarinet & Piano

The four short French works, Canzonetta, Petite Piece, Fille aux chevaux de lin, and Piece en forme de habanera have more in common than their brevity. All three composers studied at the Paris Conservatory at very young ages—Debussy and Pierne entering at ten and eight, and Ravel at the advanced age of fourteen. Debussy and Pierne were born within a year of each other in 1862 and 1863, and Pierne and Ravel died in 1937. Debussy’s Petite Piece was composed in 1910 at a time when he was involved in numerous conducting engagements: that year in Paris, Vienna, and Budapest, and the following year in Turin. This short work was used as a sightreading piece for the Conservatory’s annual concours, just as his more famous Premiere Rhapsodie has several times been the required prepared piece. Dating from the same year was Debussy’s first book of twelve preludes for piano, in which Fille aux chevaux de lin (Maid with the Flaxen Hair) is found. The transcription of this work is by Conservatory professor Gaston Hamelin, who knew Debussy and who has also contributed excellent didactic works to the clarinet’s literature.

Charles West, clarinet
Susan Grace, piano

Digitally remastered

Technical Notes:
The recorded perspective of the instruments in this recording is close... As though the 9' Hamburg Steinway and the clarinet are being played for you in your living room. The actual recording was made at the great room at Lucasfilm's Skywalker Ranch, with its incredibly low noise floor and fully adjustable acoustics.

To capture a clean, dynamic, and harmonically rich instrumental presentation, a pair of Shoeps Omni microphones were employed. The microphones' signals were amplified by two superb pure class-A microphone preamps custom-built for Wilson Audio by John Curl. MIT cable carried the balanced line level signal to Wilson Audio's UltramasterTM 3O ips analog recorder. Subsequent digital master tapes were made through the Pygmy A/D converter on a Panasonic SV-3700. Playback reference monitoring was performed on Wilson Audio WATT ll/ Puppies, driven by a Spectral DMA-5O amplifier through MIT CVT Terminator cables.

Charles West
As a solo clarinetist, Charles West has performed throughout the United States and Mexico, and in Asia and South America. Among the orchestral principal positions he has held are the El Paso Symphony Orchestra, and he currently performs as principal in the Flagstaff Festival Symphony Orchestra and with the Virginia Opera. As a performer of contemporary music he has held positions with the University of Iowa Center for New Music and is now in Richmond Virginia's new music ensemble CURRENTS. West was the first president of the combined International Clarinet Society/ClariNetwork International and he performs frequently on this organization's international convention programs.

Charles West is currently Professor of Clarinet at Virginia Commonwealth University. Previous appointments have included the University of Arizona, New Mexico State University, and Grinnell College. He holds the Doctorate in Performance and is a Fulbright Scholar. Having studied at the University of Iowa with Himie Voxman and at the University of Northern Colorado with Loren Bartlett, he has done additional study with Leon Russianoff and Robert Marcellus. West has published many articles and a composition for band, he has performed for national and international conventions of composers, teachers and performers.

Susan Grace
is Lecturer, Artist-in-Residence, and Director of Student Performance at Colorado College where she has been on the faculty since 1976. She is also Artistic Director of the Colorado College Summer Conservatory and Music Festival. She has been Principal Pianist for the Colorado Springs Symphony, Principal Accompanist for the Central City Opera, the Colorado Opera Festival, the Colorado Children's Chorale, and has performed with the National Affiliate Artist Program.

Ms. Grace studied at the University of Iowa with John Simms; she currently coaches with Benjamin Kaplan in London. She has performed solo recitals and appeared as soloist with orchestras in the United States and Europe. She has, in addition, earned recognition as a chamber music artist with performances in the Soviet Union, and China, and has performed in numerous festivals, including the Grand Teton Festival, the Music at Oxford and Helmsley Festivals in England, and the Astoria Concert Series in Brussels, Belgium. She has recorded for the Belgian National Radio and the American Society of University Composers. Ms. Grace is a member of The Colorado College Trio, Bricolage -- a piano-percussion duo specializing in new music, and Quattro Mani -- a two-piano ensemble with Alice Rybak.

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