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Work

Dare to Declare : Concerto for Marimba and Concert Band

by Anne Cawrse (2023)

Selected products featuring this work — Display all products (3 more)

Display all products featuring this work (3 more)  

Work Overview

The musical ideas for this concerto came from three important artistic voices from Australia's history - poet Oodgeroo Noonuccal, visual artist Clarice Beckett, and composer Peggy Glanville-Hicks.

The first movement Oodgeroo is a partial setting of the poem 'The Past', which explores the author's deep-felt connection to culture and the ancient wisdom of the land. The darkly resonant lowest register of the marimba is exploited in the central dreamscape of the movement. In the second movement, the delicately blurred twilight aesthetic of Clarice Beckett's paintings is reflected in the harmonic choices and textural painting of sound. Here the music embraces stillness and the interplay between softness and structure, displaying the gentle humanity present in Clarice's paintings. The final movement is a celebration of the life and music of Peggy Glanville-Hicks- an extravagant, effervescent, and feisty journey through the major modes, motoric and irregular rhythms, and percussive vitality that Peggy's music is remembered for.

These three women each wrote, painted, and spoke their truth through their representative art forms, despite the challenges facing them. In doing so, they dared to declare who they were as artists and lived with a fearless commitment to their art. This concerto celebrates their lives and their art; my prayer is that as an artist, I may grow to be as brave and as daring as they were.

Work Details

Year: 2023

Instrumentation: Solo Marimba (5 8ves), 3 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 bassoons, 2 clarinets in E flat, 3 clarinets in B flat, bass clarinet, 2 alto saxophones, tenor saxophone, baritone saxophone, 4 horns, 3 trumpets, 3 trombones, euphonium, tuba, timpani, string bass, piano, 3 percussion (min.).

Duration: 25 min.

Difficulty: Advanced — 3rd movement contains irregular meter

Commission note: This arrangement commissioned by Knox Grammar School, the University of Western Australia Conservatorium of Music, and Dr. Anna Reid.

The composer notes the following styles, genres, influences, etc in association to this work:

Peggy Glanville Hicks, in particular Etruscan Concerto, Sinfonia da Pacifica, and Sonata for Piano and Percussion.

Performances of this work

26 Nov 2023: at Australian Voices Concert (Queenwood Astra Theatre). Featuring Sydney Wind Symphony, Claire Edwardes, Fiona Lucas.

7 Jul 23: Adelaide Town Hall.. Featuring Adelaide Symphony Orchestra, Claire Edwardes, Elena Schwarz.

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