Badinage is a light-hearted miniature written for the piano by Francis Poulenc in 1934. It was first published in 1935, shortly before his friend and fellow composer Pierre-Octave Ferroud was decapitated in a car accident. That tragic event served as one of the main catalysts to Poulenc’s compositional tone, previously carefree and blithe such as in this Badinage, taking a much more serious turn.
Date: 1934 Catalogue: Francis Poulenc 73 Performer: Aleck Karis on piano
Tempo di Mazurka is a dance piece written by a seventeen year old Guillaume Lekeu for his mother, Eugénie. This particular Mazurka, similar to that of a Minuet, is structured in a rounded binary. The B section contains a velocious theme that differs from the Mazurka format and the overall somber temper of the A section.
Lekeu was born in Belgium and began his musical studies under Alphonse Voss. While still a child, his family moved to France. His counterpoint mentor, César Franck, as well as his orchestration teacher, Vincent d’Indy, encouraged him to nurture his compositional talent. Heeding their advice, Lekeu won first place in the 1891 Prix de Rome and even composed his magnum opus, his Violin Sonata in G Major (commissioned by Eugène Ysaÿe). Lekeu’s early death, on the day after his 24th birthday, likely doomed his legacy from potential immortality to relative obscurity, similar to that of Stanchinsky, Filtsch, Baines, and the tenderly young Julian Scriabin.
Date: 1887
Dedicatee: Eugénie Hausenne
Performer: Luc Devos on piano
Note: This channel does not own the score or audio, and they are only used for non-commercial purposes.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VljHSPpC0FE
“A Portrait” for solo clarinet is a standalone piece by the Canadian composer Keenan Reimer-Watts. The work, heavily inspired by the forest scene, was written during the summer in Quebec, Canada. It is one in a series of such works, where each explores its own instrument. Appearing multiple times throughout the piece is the slow section labeled “liberamente”. The rest of the piece, however, is fast, fluttery, and fleeting.
Date: 2014
Dedicatee: Justine Pearson
Performer: Peter Shackleton on clarinet
Note: This channel does not own the score or audio, and they are used for non-commercial purposes.
Score: Keenan Reimer-Watts, 2014. https://imslp.org/wiki/A_Portrait_for_Solo_Clarinet_%28Reimer-Watts%2C_Keenan%29
Composer's website: https://keenanreimerwatts.com/home
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NUiCAU0U96Y
Four Tone Pictures is a set of piano pieces written by the American composer Wallingford Riegger. Riegger was one of the first Americans to adopt the twelve-tone technique. While a student, he attended what is now Juilliard, and was in the first graduating class of that school.
Date: 1939
Order:
No. 1 - Prelude: 0:07
No. 2 - Angles and Curves: 1:01
No. 3 - Wishful Thinking: 2:05
No. 4 - Grotesque: 3:44
Performer: Gilbert Kalish on piano
Note: This channel does not own the score or audio, and they are only used for non-commercial purposes.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CG4T5ut5gz0
2 Morceaux is a pair of pieces written by Anatoly Lyadov, the second of which, is dedicated to his friend and mentor, Mily Balakirev. During this time, he had become a teacher at the St. Petersburg Conservatory, and his pupils included Stravinsky, Prokofiev, and Myaskovsky.
Date: 1884
Catalogue: Op. 9
Dedicatees:
No. 1 - A. I. Kuskova
No. 2 - Mily A. Balakirev
Order:
No. 1 - Waltz in F-sharp Minor: 0:08
No. 2 - Mazurka in A-flat Major: 1:06
Performer: Olga Solovieva on piano
Note: This channel does not own the score or audio, and they are only used for non-commercial purposes.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D78hnlt2GtM
Impromptu in B Minor by Felix Blumenfeld is a succinct composition that continuously develops a majestic harmonic major melody. That melody is then laid upon a triplet texture that variously alternates between tremolo, Alberti bass, and arpeggiated chords. The Impromptu was composed during Blumenfeld’s tenure as a piano teacher at the St. Petersburg Conservatory.
Date: 1898
Catalogue: Op. 28
Dedicatee: Nathalie Anastasieff
Performer: Margarita Glebov on piano
Note: This channel does not own the score or audio, and they are only used for non-commercial purposes.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EBIPTVRYZj8
"The Toccata (1924) is an energetic and spirited work that explores a variety of rhythmical and wayward key-changes which are interpolated onto a largely arpeggiated melody. It is a small set of variations on the Northumbrian pipe tune ‘Newburn Lads’. Imogen Holst has suggested that the composer considered that he had ‘flattered the old man with a worn-out hurdy-gurdy who used to play ‘Newburn Lads’ in Cheltenham in 1879.’ One wonders if Holst truly was impressed by this rustic performance when he was only five years old. The inspiration is more likely to have derived from his friendship with the composer, musicologist and pedagogue, W. G. Whittaker (1876-1944), who published a collection of Countrie Ballads, Songs and Pipe-Tunes in 1922. This volume featured ‘Newburn Lads’. The Toccata was dedicated to ‘Adine O’Neill and her pupils’. O’Neill (née Ruckert, 1875-1947) was a celebrated pianist and music teacher. In 1899 she had [sic] married the composer Norman O’Neill."
—John France
Date: 1924
Catalogue: Holst 153
Dedicatees: Adine O'Neill and her pupils
Performer: David Rubinstein on piano
Note: This channel does not own the score or audio, and they are only used for non-commercial purposes. This video is a reupload from Thomas van Dun, who withdrew all score videos of pieces not composed by himself.
Original Uploader’s Channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/ThomasvanDun/
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I05YTLZOjHw
“Proclamation” (originally titled “Improvisation”) for piano is a piece that dates from 1973, and was fully revised by 1982. The piece was made presentable with Bennett Lerner’s edits, and premiered in 1983. Two years later, in 1985, its dedicatee, Phillip Ramey, orchestrated the piece.
Date: 1973/1982
Dedicatee: Phillip Ramey
Performer: Ramon Salvatore on piano
Note: This channel does not own the score or audio, and they are only used for non-commercial purposes.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=azjaJhqYrV0
The “Deep Note”, conceived by James Moorer, is the trademark sound of the THX movie studio founded by director George Lucas. It first appeared on the movie “Star Wars: Episode VI – Return of the Jedi”, and has since graced the trailers and introductions of many video games, movie theater screens, and DVDs. By the year 2021, there are three existing versions due to revisions and upgrades.
Date: 1982
Note: This channel does not own the score or audio, and they are used for non-commercial purposes.
I intend to engrave it and reupload it in the future.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LaTuNrhSWs0
The Sixth Keyboard Sonata of Italian Vox Saeculorum composer Gianluca Bersanetti is a joyous and exuberant single-movement piece inspired by the late Italian Baroque style of his fellow countryman of yore, Domenico Scarlatti. As was common in Scarlatti’s keyboard sonatas, Bersanetti’s own Keyboard Sonata No. 6 is structured in binary form. In this particular sonata, the first section begins in the key of E Major and concludes in the dominant key of B. The second section begins in the same dominant key of B Major and returns to the tonic (subdominant of B) of E Major on which it ends. Although there is no tempo marking indicated, the piece, with its compound duple meter and horn fifths, demonstrates a thematic affinity towards the hunting sport. An observable rhythmic motif involves the left hand providing the bass and beat, followed by two weaker notes on the offbeats, and whenever the motif is absent, liquid flourishes of rapid scales interspersed throughout the work.
Date: 2008
Performer: Michele Barchi on harpsichord
Performer’s channel: https://www.youtube.com/@MBharpsichord
Note: This channel does not own the score or audio, and they are used for non-commercial purposes.
Composer’s channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC1sQta2Y7Sdz3EwClw_Ksbw
Score: https://imslp.org/wiki/Keyboard_Sonata_No.6_in_E_major_%28Bersanetti%2C_Gianluca%29
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a5o1fvO1P4s