MORTEN LAURIDSEN VARIATIONS for Piano
My Variations for Piano was premiered in 1972 by Cinda Goold Redman and recorded by Ralph Grierson on “Lauridsen – Northwest Journey (RCM).” The work belongs to that smaller group of abstract, atonal works of mine that include the Cuatro Canciones on poems by Lorca for voice, clarinet, cello and piano and the Canticle/O vos omnes for clarinet or vibraphone, women’s voices and chimes, and is dedicated to Aaron Copland, in memorium, whose own Piano Variations stand among the seminal works in the contemporary piano repertoire. A stark theme containing several intervallic cells provides the springboard for four quite free variations. Variations I and II explore various manipulations of the thematic cells in an almost improvisatory manner. Variation III is a Coplandesque dance and the final variation treats the theme in canon, concluding with a restatement of the theme as a coda. —Morten Lauridsen
The music of Morten Lauridsen, Distinguished Professor of Composition at the University of Southern California Thornton School of Music, occupies a permanent place in the standard vocal repertoire of the Twenty-First Century. His works, including eight vocal cycles, art songs, instrumental works and a series of sacred motets, are regularly performed throughout the world and have been recorded on over 200 CDs, several of which have received Grammy nominations. An award-winning documentary by filmmaker Michael Stillwater, “Shining Night: A Portrait of Composer Morten Lauridsen,” was released in 2012. Named an “American Choral Master” by the National Endowment for the Arts in 2005, Morten Lauridsen received the 2007 National Medal of Arts, the highest artistic award in the United States, by the President in a White House ceremony “for his composition of radiant choral works combining musical beauty, power, and spiritual depth.”
For more about Morten Lauridsen: www.mortenlauridsen.net and www.peermusicClassical.com