Sextets
CRITICAL MOMENTS (1996) Schott 7’
Flute (Picc.), Clarinet in B-flat (E-flat Picc., Bass Clarinet), Violin, Violoncello, Piano, Percussion
First performance April 14, 1997, New York: New York New Music Ensemble, cond. David Gilbert
CRITICAL MOMENTS 2 (in nine movements) (2001) Schott 12′
Flute, Clarinet in B flat, Violin, Violoncello, Piano, Percussion
First performance March 5, 2002, eighth blackbird, New York, Alice Tully Hall
Cedille Records CDR90000 067 (eighth blackbird)
George Perle rarely writes music with words; his compositions are exquisitely formulated solutions to musical problems that are best confronted in their abstract state. (A lovely exception to the rule is the composer’s “Thirteen Dickinson Songs,” from 1978, which were sung by Lucy Shelton on a recent New York concert celebrating Perle’s ninetieth birthday.) Of all the American modernist composers to emerge after World War II, he has proved to be the most delectable craftsman; he won the Pulitzer Prize for Music in 1986 for his Wind Quintet No. 4. He has also authored definitive texts on the music of Schoenberg, Webern, Scriabin, Bartok, and, especially, Berg. The eminence of George Perle the expositor and theorist is so high that it may have diverted some attention away from his own compositional output. To miss the music, though, would be a mistake, according to the critic Andrew Porter, who lauds “the vividness of [Perle’s] melodic gestures, the lively rhythmic sense, the clarity and shapeliness of his discourse and, quite simply, the charm and grace of his utterance.”
Critical Moments 2 (2001) is a fine showcase for these qualities. As Perle describes it, “The instrumentation of these nine short, self-contained, and strikingly individual movements for six players corresponds to that of Pierrot Lunaire, except for the substitution of a percussion part for the quasi-spoken (Sprechstimme) vocal part of Schoenberg’s work. I had taken much pleasure in the composition of a set of six such pieces in 1995-96, and was already strongly inclined to undertake such a project again when an unexpected commission from the Naumburg Foundation gave me an opportunity to do exactly that for [the group] eighth blackbird.”
Before listening to this fetching piece, we might dwell on the double implications of its title. On the face of it, “critical moments” refers to especially intense episodes of experience—and each one of Perle’s little movements—as the air of a denouement, however quiet and subtle its atmosphere may be. But “critical” also implies the acts of evaluation and examination, and as such may be a door, however modest, into the composer’s Lilliputian formal strategies. A number of the “Moments” state a strong idea at the outset—enunciated by one player or by a group of instruments—and return to it in altered form after a diversionary idea quickly counters the first one; a general discussion of these elements follows, with the initial ideas retaining their recognizable shapes. (Some ideas, like the snare drum roll in No. 5, are dramatic devices; they undergo no change at all.) It seems like an echo of the so-called “stratification-interlock-synthesis” technique which American theorists evinced in the later work of Stravinsky, a composer also recalled in Perle’s deft and nimble rhythmic play. (The piece cries out for choreography.)
In a famous quip, Olivier Messiaen, looking over the avant-garde scene of his heyday, harrumphed about the “international grey on grey” sound-palette that infected so much postwar serialist music. But Perle, with his unique system of “twelve-tone tonality” (which readers can further explore in Paul Lansky’s essay on the composer), never succumbed to that school. Throughout these “Moments”—as in many of his other works—there is a remarkable, and rewarding, correlation between the flow of consonance and dissonance and the expressive intentions of Perle’s ingratiating musical gestures.
— Russell Platt
FOR PIANO AND WINDS (1988) Schott 7’
Flute, English Horn, Clarinet in A, Bassoon, French Horn, Piano
First performance March 19, 21, 1989, New York: Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center
Quintets
NIGHTSONG (formerly “Andante tranquillo”) (1988) Schott 5’
Flute, Clarinet, Violin, Violoncello, Piano
First performance March 7, 1991, New York: Da Capo Chamber Players
DUOS (1995) Schott 15’
French Horn and String Quartet
First performance July 10, 11, 1996, Kalamazoo, MI: David Jolley, Fontana Concert Society
QUINTET FOR STRINGS (1958) Schott 25’
2 Violins, 2 Violas, Violoncello
First performance Feb. 19, 1960, San Francisco: The Composers Forum
SONATA A CINQUE (1986) Schott 15’
Bass Trombone, Clarinet in A (E-flatPicc.)(Bass Clarinet), Violin, Violoncello, Piano
First performance Feb. 28, 1987, New York: David Taylor et al., 92nd St. Y
WIND QUINTET NO. 1 (1959) Presser 11’
First performance April 8, 1959, Berkeley, California: California Wind Quintet
New World CD #359-2 (Dorian Wind Quintet)
WIND QUINTET NO. 2 (1960) Schott 10’
First performance May 6, 1962, New York: New York Wind Quintet
New World CD #359-2 (Dorian Wind Quintet)
WIND QUINTET NO. 3 (1967) Schott 13’
First performance April 5, 1968, Chicago: Chicago Symphony Wind Quintet
New World CD #359-2 (Dorian Wind Quintet)
WIND QUINTET NO. 4 (1984) (Pulitzer Prize) Schott 18’
First performance Oct. 2, 1985, New York: Dorian Wind Quintet
New world CD #359-2 (Dorian Wind Quintet)
Quartets
MOLTO ADAGIO for String Quartet (1938) Schott 11’30”
SONATA A QUATTRO (1982) Schott 19’
Flute, Clarinet, Violin, Violoncello
First performance May 17, 1982, New York: Da Capo Chamber Players
GM CD # 2020 (Da Capo Chamber Players)
STRING QUARTET NO. 5 (1960, rev. 1967) Presser 13’
First performance Aug. 13, 1967, Tanglewood
Nonesuch LP #H-71280
STRING QUARTET NO. 7 (1973) Schott 22’
First performance March 19, 1974, Buffalo, NY: Cleveland Quartet
CRI LP #S-387, Cassette #ACS-6015
WINDOWS OF ORDER (String Quartet No. 8) (1988) Schott 17’
First performance April 6, 7, 1989, Washington, D.C., Juilliard Quartet
BRIEF ENCOUNTERS (String Quartet No. 9) (1998) Schott 30’
First performance May 14, 1999, Chicago: Chicago String Quartet
Duets
LYRIC PIECE for Cello and Piano (1946) Schott 4’
Paradox LP # PL 10001-A (Barab, Masselos)
GM CD # 2020 (Emelianoff, Rothenberg)
SONATA for Cello and Piano (1985) Schott 17’
First performance April 13, 1985, New York: Emelianoff, McDermott
GM CD #2020 (Emelianoff, McDermott)
SONATA QUASI UNA FANTASIA for Clarinet and Piano (1972) Presser 11’
First performance March 19, 1972, Buffalo, NY: Laneri, Perle
TRIPTYCH for Solo Violin and Piano (2003) Schott 10′
First performance Jan. 27, 2003, New York: Curtis Macomber and Christopher Oldfather
Solos for Piano
BALLADE (1981) Peters 9’
First performance Feb. 17, 1982, New York: Richard Goode
CHANSONS CACHÉES (1997) Schott 15’
First performance Dec. 8, 1997, Boston: Martin Amlin
CLASSIC SUITE (1938) Schott
First performance 1951, Louisville, KY: George Perle
FANTASY VARIATIONS (1971) Schott 7’
First performance Nov. 6, 1986, Sacramento, CA: Michael Boriskin
New World CD #NW342-2 (Boriskin)
LITTLE SUITE (1939) MS 3’
First performance Oct.22, 1939, Chicago: Jacobeth Kerr
LYRIC INTERMEZZO (1987) Schott 16’
First performance Nov. 7, 1987, Seattle, WA: Shirley Rhoads
New World CD #NW380-2 (Boriskin)
MODAL SUITE for Piano Solo (1940) Schott 3′
New World CD #80590-2 (Arzuni)
MUSICAL OFFERINGS for left hand alone (1998) Schott 9’
First performance December 6, 1999, New York: Leon Fleisher
NINE BAGATELLES (1999) Schott 8′
First performance March 2, 2002, Rockford, IL: Guttiérrez
PANTOMIME, INTERLUDE, AND FUGUE (1937) Schott 4’
First performance Feb. 27, 1982, New York: Shirley Rhoads
New World CD #342-2 (Boriskin)
PHANTASYPLAY (1995) Schott 8’
First performance April 2, 1997, New York: Bruce Levingston
“The title Phantasyplay, derived from the German word Phantasiespiel, was chosen by Mr. Perle to reflect the music’s spirit of ‘dual citizenship’ as well as its character, which is, indeed, both fantastic and playful (and not unlike some of the multi-faceted fantasies of Schumann’s Kreisleriana). Immensely concentrated and certainly difficult (at least for the player), this eight-minute work essentially falls into five sections:
an impetuous, cross-rhythmic opening with daring leaps and chords, delicate double-note passages, and jagged octaves;a tender Andante in which questioning, arching intervals portend deeper developments;a mischievous scherzando with teasing syncopations and humorous, graceful arabesques;a haunting, dark-hued Adagio in which earlier motifs are brought to their full lyrical bloom;a recapitulation of the opening material with a subtle, Puckish reordering of events that leads to an unexpectedly brief but explosive coda. The final clarion chord is classic Perle: restrained, yet ecstatic.”
— Bruce Levingston, program notes for the world premiere
SHORT SONATA (1964) Presser 8’
First performance May 5 1965, New York: Robert Miller
New World CD #NW342-2 (Boriskin)
SIX CELEBRATORY INVENTIONS (1995) Schott 8’
First performance Jan. 17, 1997, Boston: Russell Sherman
GM Recordings 2071CD (Sherman)
“Perle’s pieces, contrapuntal birthday greetings for six friends, are chips from the master’s workbench. They depend for their effect on Perle’s powerful insight into the tonal anchors of atonality, and they display the elegant and inevitable finish of detail that characterizes all his music. Has anybody ever known how and when to end a piece any better? Two of the most striking ‘Inventions’ are the plangently lyrical tribute to Gunther Schuller on his 70th birthday (Schuller was in the audience) and a gift for Leonard Bernstein composed for his 70th birthday and wittily incorporating elements of his style. In fact, each of these greetings is also a musical portrait of its recipient. Sherman”s performances were deft and as deceptively transparent as the music.”
—Richard Dyer, The Boston Globe, January 18, 1997“Each of the six Perle Inventions marks a milestone birthday of a composing colleague. The first, written in 1981 for Ernst Krenek at 85, has a let-’er-rip energy… The lyrically chameleonic Henri Dutilleux at 80 inspired a delicate movement, and the 40th birthday of Oliver Knussen lit musical candles that burn brightly and peppily. There’s gentleness for Gunther Schuller at 70, and a piece mainly swift and loud but ending softly for Richard Swift at 60. For Leonard Bernstein’s hectic, sprawling, very happy 70th birthday celebrations at Tanglewood in 1970 there’s lots of syncopation, brawling octaves, a bit of good jazz, and a fortissimo final sprint that suddenly hits the deck pianissimo.”
— Leighton Kerner, The Village Voice, March 18, 1997
SIX ETUDES (1976) Schott 10’
First performance October 29, 1976, Boston: Morey Ritt
New World CD #80304-2 (Gowen); Harmonia mundi CD #907124 (Boriskin) Centaur CD #CRC231 (Renzi)
SIX NEW ETUDES (1984) Schott 10’
First performance May 7, 1984, Beijing, China: Shirley Ann Seguin
New World CD # NW342-2 (Boriskin)
SIX PRELUDES (1946) Schott 4’
First performance July, 1953, Belem, Brazil: Robert Below
CRI LP #SD-288 (Helps)
SONATA (1950) Peer-Southern 4’
First performance Feb. 11, 1951, New York: George Perle
SONATINA (1986) Schott 5’
First performance Nov. 6, 1986, Sacramento, CA: Michael Boriskin
New World CD #NW380-2 (Boriskin)
SUITE IN C (1970) Schott 13’
First performance April 29, 1987, Washington, D.C.: Michael Boriskin
New World CD #NW342-2 (Boriskin)
TOCCATA (1969) Presser 6’
First performance Nov. 20, 1972, New York: Robert Miller
New World CD #NW342-2 (Boriskin)
Solos for Winds
BASSOON MUSIC for Solo Bassoon (2004) Schott 6′
First performance 2009, Merkin Hall, New York: Steven Dibner
MONODY I for Solo Flute (1960) Presser 6’
First performance May 10, 1962, New York: Samuel Baron
CRI LP #ST-212 (Baron)
Neuma CD #450-88 (Spencer)
THREE INVENTIONS for Solo Bassoon (1962) Presser 5’
First performance March 26, 1963, New York: William Scribner
Coronet LP #2741 (Grossman)
Orion LP #ORS77269 (Cordle)
THREE SONATAS for Solo Clarinet (1943) Presser 13’
First performance Aug. 7, 1955, Chicago: Helen Joyce
Solos for Strings
HEBREW MELODIES for Solo Cello (1945) Presser 4’
First performance Jan. 24, 1947, New York: Seymour Barab
DACO CD #102 (Von Albrecht) Albany CD, Troy #157 (Honigberg)
DG CD #453417-2GH (Haimovitz)
MONODY II for Solo Bass (1962) Presser 4’
First performance Nov. 2, 1962, New Paltz, NY: Bertram Turetzky
Titanic CD, Ti-255 (Lawrence Wolfe)
SOLO PARTITA for Violin and Viola (1 [or2] players) (1965) Schott 12’
First performance April 23, 1965, Chicago: Irving Ilmer
SONATA for Solo Viola (1942) Peer-Southern 9’
SONATA for Solo Cello (1947) Schott 12’
First performance Feb. 22, 1949, New York: Seymour Barab
SONATA NO. 1 for Solo Violin (1959) Schott 8’
First performance March 13, 1960, Davis, CA: Robert Bloch
SONATA NO. 2 for Solo Violin (1963) Schott 18’
First performance Feb. 20, 1966, Boston: Matthew Raimondi