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D57FD1A2-0FD7-457C-BC03-8B892C967980
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Pilgrimage (1988) is cast in a single twelve-minute movement of five large sections. There are several signposts that serve to guide the listener on a pilgrimage to J. S. Bach. The melody line of the refrain, presented in the first three measures, contains three quarters of the "B-A-C-H motive" (B-flat, A, C). The chorale at the end, including the "H" (B-natural) completes the pilgrimage. Commissioned and recorded by Delores Stevens.
Instrumentation
Solo Piano
Commission
Commissioned by Delores Stevens for her 1988 - 89 California Arts Council Tour.
Dedication
Program Notes
Pilgrimage is cast in a single twelve-minute movement of five large sections. There are several signposts that serve to guide the listener on a pilgrimage to J. S. Bach. The melody line of the refrain, presented in the first three measures, contains three quarters of the "B-A-C-H motive" (B-flat, A, C). This motive reappears as the melody unfolds in one or more legato voices with staccato notes dancing around them. Other signposts include a fugal section in the lowest register (with punctuations on the piano's lowest B-flat); and climactic moment in which fortissimo "splats" on the piano are juxtaposed with a clear perfect fourth (the top note of which is the long sought after B-natural needed to complete the BACH motive). The chorale at the end, including the "H" (B-natural) completes the pilgrimage. --Donald Crockett
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Premier Performance Memo
-Vicki Ray. 03 Sep 91, 15 Oct 91. -Vicky Ray. 25 May 90. National Association of Composers USA.
Recording Credits
Recorded by Delores Stevens, Pilgrimage, Dominguez Digital CD 1.0. Recorded by Vicki Ray, From the left edge, CRI CD830.
Review
"...and expansive, ingratiation score mixing dissonant outbursts and serene tonal hamonies..." --Joshua Kosman, San Francisco Chronicle<BR><BR> "Of his Pilgrimage (1988) Donald Crockett writes: "It is a pilgrimage to B-A-C-H. The opening melodic material, which is presented as longer notes in the top voice, begins Bb-A-C and then continues with those three top notes as the motivic basis for a melody. A number of things happen along the way to completing B-A-C as B-A-C-H. Among them: the melodic material is presented in two-voice texture and [then in] three voices; there is a very strange little fugue for contrabassoons with punctuations (of out-rage?) from Bach himself in the form of the low Bb; there is a royal procession, either with the master being borne triumphantly on a dais or with the pilgrim (me) heading toward him, take your pick; then there is a return of the two- and three-voice versions of the B6-A-C [melody] before the climax is reached and we finally get to hear the completion of B-A-C-H, though disguisedÉ It is not until the last two pages that the pilgrimage is complete, however. The opening melodic material is presented as a chorale with the B natural present, always in the same high register." <BR><BR> Ever since Johann Sebastian Bach himself used the subsequently famous musical motto B(Bb)-A-C-H(B-natural), composers have written pieces using that four-note constellation. The results have ranged from the trivial (Rimsky-Korsakov's Variations) to the grandiose (Liszt's Fantasy and Fugue on B-A-C-H). Perhaps Crockett's piece is the only one of these that has made the listener wait so long through B, A, and C to get to H. It has a culminating effect-but also a touching one. Is it too much to read into his reflective close Crockett's musing on what those four letters mean to us? <BR><BR> Regardless of associations at the end of the piece, Crockett gives us plenty of other stimulation on the way to it. (The whole piece lasts just over 11 minutes.) From the opening, marked deftly, hushed but syncopated, to the "very strange little fugue" marked Not without humor!, Crockett shows a certain ease, an informality, which mixes unexpectedly well with his often dissonant harmonic style. This is a "synthesis piece," very much of our day in its welding of rhythmic outbursts, gentleness, consonance, dissonance, formalistic procedures, casualness, and humor into a seriously conceived work that never suggests the monumental. <BR><BR> Crockett frequently uses a type of piano writing he calls "diatonic pointillism." While the sostenuto pedal is aiding in the projection of a legato line, staccato notes play all around it in pointillistic fashion. These staccato notes, however, tend to be part of diatonic, rather than fully chromatic, constructions. The pointillistic quality is worked through quite effectively in Crockett's Concerto for Piano and Winds (reviewed in the November/December 1994 P&K). His use of the piano is idiomatic, especially for a player with good-sized hands, but challenging in the coordination it asks, and tends more toward staccato than toward lyrical qualities. The composer comments: "It is very important for the pianist to project the underlying rock 'n' roll in the rhythms of the piece, rather than to focus on the possibly more obvious 'modern music' aspects. Much of my work has popular music embedded in it but rarely projected on the surface as a pastiche or send-up." <BR><BR> Unfortunately, these illuminating notes on the piece are not included in the score nor is there any biographical note about this most interesting composer. Born in California, Crockett is on the faculty at the University of Southern California. He wrote Pilgrimage on commission from pianist Dolores Stevens. Come on somebody--commission another one! <BR>Bradford Gowen, Piano & amp; Keyboard
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