*(1)
String
Quintet (quartet plus cello)
String
Quintet
parts Cover
(2)
String
Orchestra
String
Orchestra
parts Cover
My
uncle, David Vanderkooi, plays all the different kinds of viols. He told me
about the Leo M. Traynor Competition, sponsored by the Viola da Gamba Society
of America, for works not longer than five minutes for viol consort. This
sounded like an interesting challenge; viol music can be quite enchanting and
enjoyable, and having just finished a work for harpsichord, I was used to the
idea of antique instruments. Besides, I have never come close to winning a
composition prize, where the judges are almost always new music specialists
interested in the avant-garde, which is far from my taste. This is unlikely to
be a problem with viols.
It is difficult for me
to write anything of just five minutes, so I settled for four movements of that
length with the intention of submitting one movement. According to the
metronome, two of the movements are exactly five minutes long, although it just
sort of happened that way.
However, I was unable to
submit any of the movements for the contest as I had posted the score on my
website, which they considered to be publication. Picky picky picky.
Turns out,
the piece was idiomatic for the string instruments I grew up with, and not very
much for viols. I have arranged it for both string quintet, and for string
orchestra. These works for modern instruments should be played in the usual
manner and not in imitation of the original for viols. The main lingering
effect of the viol origins is the limited upper range of the violins, which
should encourage amateur groups to take this on.