Jazz Sonorities, Patrick Hardish

Product Description

Jazz Sonorities (2002) was composed for Esther Lamneck at her request and premiered by her and Barbara Allen on drums at the Loewe Theater of New York University on May 30, 2002. Ms. Lamneck asked me to compose a piece for either solo clarinet or clarinet and piano. I decided on the former to continue my ""Sonorities"" series of works for solo instruments which eventually resulted in Sonorities VII for solo b-flat clarinet (2003-04). However, shortly after getting started with my ""Sonorities VII"" I kept hearing the swinging sounds of a jazz clarinet backed up by a jazz drum set. Part of the reason I kept hearing these sounds is that I grew up listening to the big swing bands of such clarinet leaders as Benny Goodman, Artie Shaw, Woody Herman, and Jimmy Dorsey. These musicians were my first exposure to the clarinet. So I decided to first compose a piece for clarinet with a jazz quality and a swinging partly ad lib part for the drums and to put my solo clarinet piece for Esther on hold for a year. There was also a personal reason to use the drums in the piece. My first ambition in music was to be a jazz drummer and indeed I studied drums with a jazz drummer and played drums professionally in dance bands for several years.