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This work for clarinet quintet in three movements was written following time spent in the north of Scotland, during which I visited the remote and desolate places that my family left behind when they emigrated from Scotland to New Zealand in the 19th Century. Although the music is not intended to be strictly descriptive, the image underpinning the work is that of an infinite shore that stretches from the line of steep cliffs at Badbea overlooking the North Sea, around the world to the rocky southern shores of Aotearoa New Zealand. The work draws on the tonal colour and extremes of pitch that are possible in the clarinet, and the extraordinary platform of sound of the string quartet.

• Webster: An Infinite Shore; computer set 

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• 5 Works by M Louise Webster 

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And every sparkle shivering to new blaze,
In number did outmillion the account
Reduplicate upon a chequered board

Dante, The Divine Comedy – Paradise XXVIII
Translation by Rev. H.F.Cary (1814)

Observe the circle nearest, and know
the reason for its spinning at such speed
is that Love’s fire burns it into motion.

Dante, The Divine Comedy – Paradise XXVII
Translated by Mark Musa (1995)

In Canto 28 of Paradise, Dante, the pilgrim, is faced with an unbearably piercing light reflected in the eyes of his beloved guide, Beatrice. He turns and sees nine ever decreasing circles burning and whirling at different speeds. These circles give off sparks that sing hosannas. Dante has seen a spherical universe with God at the centre. He asks why the universe is not really like this, Beatrice tells him that he is now seeing it from a spiritual rather than a physical point of view, and that the reason for the great speed of the inner circle “is that Love’s fire burns it into motion”.

This imagery of circles within circles whirling, burning and giving off sparks seems to demand some musical treatment. It suggests a number of musical ideas revolving around each other and establishing a smooth relationship, and the warmer notion of love setting these ideas in motion.

The quintet, which is in one continuous movement, revolves around five central ideas. These ideas are moved around like pieces on a chessboard, each trying to gain some strategic advantage in pursuit of a single objective. Two of these ideas provide the rhythmic drive of the piece. The first, hesitant, but gathering speed and rising in pitch, is introduced by the viola at the beginning. The second, direct and syncopated, is announced by all four strings when they play together for the first time, before it is taken up by the piano. The main source of melodic material is a quiet tune, a love song, that threads its way through the piece, played first by the two violins and viola. The full version is heard in a piano solo played simply in octaves. In another guise this tune becomes the fourth idea, a fast dance that gathers momentum as the quintet reaches its climax. The fifth idea, fast accumulating scales, links the melodic and rhythmic elements and helps provide energy. The piece begins with a piano chord, which becomes a pivot for all these ideas and crops up in a variety of ways at crucial points.

And Every Sparkle Shivering is something like a mosaic composed by inlaying small tesserae of coloured stone or glass to create a sparkling over-all design. There is conflict between the warmth and vigour of sparking fire and spinning circles, and the coolness of glinting stone and flickering glass.

• Cresswell: and every sparkle shivering; computer-set 

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• Cresswell: and every sparkle shivering; computer-set 

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• Waiteata Collection of New Zealand Music Vol. 11 - Chamber Music III  Year: 2010 

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Flute Quintet was composed as the major work for my Honours project in Composition. While some of the movements are programmatic, others have no program whatsoever attached to them.

• McKenzie: Flute Quintet; computer-set 

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• McKenzie: Flute Quintet; computer-set 

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• McKenzie: Flute Quintet; computer 

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• Music by Lachlan McKenzie 

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Scored for flute, clarinet, vibraphone/marimba, piano, violin, viola and cello, this piece was written for performance by members of the Stockhausen’s ensemble, including parts designed specifically for Aloys Kontarsky, Siegfried Palm, and Cristoph Caskel, who, at the time, were the world’s leading performers of contemporary music. To the composer it seemed unlikely the work could ever be played in New Zealand, although it is noteworthy that Douglas Lilburn chose this as the first score to publish under his newly founded Waiteata editions imprint, such was his admiration for the composer’s achievement. However, with growing numbers of skilled and committed performers in New Zealand, ‘For Seven’ eventually received its New Zealand premiere in 1992, by the new music ensemble CadeNZa. Since then it has had several other fine performances here, and well as others in Europe. Recognition of the work’s status within our musical canon can be judged from the simultaneous CD publication of two different versions of the work, one by the UK-based ensemble Lontano conducted by Odaline de la Martinez, and another by Stroma. ‘For Seven’ was one of the first pieces to combine elements from the two major European schools of the time – the Eastern European cluster music, and the serialism of Boulez and Stockhausen. The piece consists of various lines of composed accelerandi and ritardandi, determined by a network of simple numerical ratios. These ratios also govern other aspects of the piece, such as the lengths of sections and the pitch intervals used. Combined with the highly structured ‘foreground’ material is more amorphous ‘background’ material (including some improvisatory elements), with frequent interaction between the two. Though the construction of the piece is complex, the result had a natural musicality and flow. McLeod has said that, although she was not conscious of it at the time of composition, she now hears clearly the influence of the sounds of the New Zealand bush. (Programme note: Mark Jones).

• McLeod: For Seven; facsimile  Year: 1967 

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• Lontano: New Zealand Women Composers 

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• Waiteata Collection of New Zealand Music Vol. 5 - Composer Portrait: Jenny McLeod 

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• Whitehead/McLeod  Year: 1972 

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• Psathas: Helix; computer-set 

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• John Psathas: Helix  Year: 2011 

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Hineputehue translates literally as the woman of the sound of the gourd, and she is the Maori goddess of peace. The work was written in 2001, at the time of President Bush’s State of the Union address shortly before the invasion of Afghanistan, and suggests the fragility rather than the celebration of peace, particularly in a pre-European environment.

A number of instruments used in Hineputehue are made of gourds – the gourd, which carried food and water, is a symbol of peace. These include the poi awiowhio, a very quiet bird lure which is swung around the head, the tiny koauau ponga ihu or noseflute which ends the piece, the hue puru hau, a large gourd which is blown across its top opening and the gourd rattles played by the quartet. Two other wind instruments frequently made from gourds, the nguru and the ororuarangi, are also used. Other instruments are the putatara or conch shell trumpet, traditionally used for signalling, the pu kaea or war trumpet, a nguru niho paraoa or flute made from a whale’s tooth, the pumotomoto, associated with birth, and tumutumu (tapped percussion).

There is a similarity between the stringed instruments of the quartet and the gourds, in that they are made from plant material, with sound emitted through sound holes. Another link is the ku, the only stringed instrument known to Maori, which is a small musical bow played like a jaws harp (jews harp) using the mouth as a resonating chamber. The idea of ororuarangi, which can be translated as spirit voice (or double stopping in a different context) has had some influence on this piece as in the parallel movement of the strings.

• Whitehead: Hineputehue; computer-set 

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• Whitehead: Hineputehue; computer set 

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• Whitehead: Hineputehue; computer set 

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• NZIAF: Gillian Whitehead Portrait; part 2 

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• Whitehead: Bright Silence  Year: 2002 

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• Gillian Whitehead: Puhake ki te rangi  Year: 2007 

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• decadence - celebrating 10 years of Besser and Bravura 

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• Jonathan Besser: Mr. Darwin's Dances  Year: 1999 

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• Paragon Premieres - 1  Year: 1991 

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One winter morning, a short walk from the marae at Waihi, on the southern shore of Lake Taupo, I stood on the shore to watch the sun rise. Behind me, a waterfall lead to a small stream that flowed into the lake, imposing its own patterns on those of the lake. The water was uniformly grey, but as the sun rose, for a moment the tops of the ripples were golden, with darker valleys between, before the whole area was flooded with light. So the ideas behind this trio have to do with the changing perspectives of patterns in water – in the bubbling of streams, the tumble of a waterfall, in the spiralling eddies where stream meets lake at sunrise.

In the opening movement, a group of short themes and ideas initially form a mosaic-like section, which recurs in developed and varied forms around more reflective passages. The second movement reverses the first, in that slow, sustained sections are interrupted by more energetic material, and the final movement draws all the previous ideas together.

• Whitehead: Piano Trio; computer-set 

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• Whitehead: Piano Trio; computer set 

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• Whitehead: Piano Trio; computer-set 

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• NZTrio: bright tide moving between  Year: 2008 

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• Williams, M.: Piano Trio No.1; computer set 

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• Michael Williams: Piano Trio No. 1 

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