piano

Commission: Radio Music Department — CBC

The term prelude has been used flexibly. Even so, it might be stretching things a little to group two small nocturnes (“Notturnino I” and “Notturnino II”), two small toccatas (“Toccatella I” and “Toccatella II”), two character pieces (“At the Window” and “Boogie Demon — Let’s GO”), and two small études (“Emergings: Kaleidoscope” and “Dita Correnti”) into one set of works entitled Preludes. I suppose some might even think it an outright contradiction in terms (that is to say, classifying a work as a prelude and, at the same time, calling it a notturnino or a toccatella). I didn’t — so I did. Semantics aside, all eight preludes comprising the collection were composed according to one set of objectives: clarity of idea; transparency in form; (relative) brevity in overall duration; distinctive use of the piano; and consistency in mood, atmosphere or texture. Despite their variety of forms, styles and tide, then, these preludes share characteristics that distinguish well-known works also called preludes; take, for example, those by Debussy, Chopin, or even J.-S. Bach.

Preludes was commissioned through The CBC Radio Music Department.

• Recording: CD: Arktos 20039/40