Annual American Composers Update
Walter S. Hartley
Walter S. Hartley is Professor Emeritus, after 23 years
on the faculty, and Composer in Residence at the SUNY
College at Fredonia School of Music. New compositions
written in 1998 include
Quartet for Clarinets; Festive
Ode to Yerevan; Reeds at Play, for three oboes and
English horn; Sinfonia No.12, for woodwind choir; and
Birds in Space, for clarinet quartet and wind ensemble.
In 1998, he was guest composer at the Mars Hill Coll.
(NC) Saxophone Retreat (April 3 and 5), at the Yerevan
(Armenia) Music School and Conservatoire (June 5-6); at
the Northern Arizona Univ. Saxophone Workshop in Flagstaff
(June 23-28); at the Transylvania Saxophone Institute
in Lexington, KY (July 20-26); at Indiana Univ. (Sept.
18-20); and at Florida State Univ. (Nov. 18).
Premieres
On Jan. 4, 1998,
Moods of the Pacific (1997), for
soprano, oboe, bassoon, and piano, received its first
performance from the Buried Treasures Ensemble, at the
Church of the Ascension, in Buffalo, NY. The American
Clarinet Quartet (members of the U.S. Air Force Heritage
of America Band at Langley Air Force Base in Virginia)
toured with the premiere of
Quartet for Clarinets
(1998), March 1998. As part of Hartley's residency at
Transylvania Univ. in Lexington, Charlie Kahn, alto saxophone,
and Krista Wallace-Boaz and Hartley, piano, presented
Festive Ode to Yerevan, July 24, 1998.
Performances
In 1998, Ronald Caravan and Sar Strong played
Metamorphoses
for Clarinet and Piano (1975) in Buffalo (Jan. 14)
and Syracuse, NY (Feb. 19-20). The Bel Canto Trio performed
Trio Estatico (1990-91), for alto saxophone, tenor
saxophone, and piano, at the University of North Carolina
at Charlotte, March 28, 1998. Russell Mikkelson led the
Fredonia (NY) Wind Symphony in
Centennial Symphony
(1995), at SUNY College at Fredonia, April 28, 1998. At
a Northern Arizona Univ. program, June 27, 1998, Lawrence
Gwozdz, alto saxophone, and A. Mikalajewski, piano, presented
Sonata Elegiaca (1987); and Steven Mauk, soprano
saxophone, and Mikolajewski gave a performance of
Sonata
for Soprano Sax (1994).
Publications
Quintet No.3 for Brass (1997); Nichols Music Co.
Recordings
Two Pieces and
Sonata Euphonica, Barry Kilpatrick,
euphonium, and Phyllis Orr East, piano; Mark Recordings.
Solemn Music, for brass quartet, and
Nothing
but Valves; Eroica Records.
Further Information
