PRISM Quartet plays Music by William Albright

Innova 687

William Albright (1944-1998) took his doctorate in composition from the University of Michigan in 1970 and immediately joined its composition department which he later served as chairman. But he also had a remarkable career as a performer, and he played literally all over the world. He received numerous commissions, including those from the Koussevitzky Foundation, two Fulbright scholarships, and two Guggenheim fellowships, and his compositions have been played by symphony orchestras ranging from Detroit and St. Paul to Bergen and Budapest.

Bill was a rarity, and William Bolcom, his friend and colleague for many years, judged that he was one of the finest organists in the world. Bill had studied organ with Marilyn Mason and composition with Messiaen (as well as Finney and Rochberg), and I personally remember hearing him play Messiaen’s improbably difficult Livre d’orgue (1951) in Michigan’s Hill Auditorium. I followed the performance with score in hand, shaking my head in disbelief. But he could also introduce a mixture of fun and seriousness for the same instrument, as in his King of Instruments, where he advises the performer to draw ‘the funniest sounding stop,’ or as in Flights of Fancy, where the sounds of the caliope in one movement are immediately followed by a powerfully ruminative hymn dedicated to the memory of his mother.

His prowess at the piano was also well known to all who ever heard him play. Those of us at the University of Michigan who remember him as a student (I can still see him sitting on the back row next to Syd Hodkinson in my Renaissance class) and for many more years as a colleague, where he began as associate director of the electronic music studio, also recall with special affection the electrifying acoustic rhythms coming from practice rooms or studios in the 1960s as he helped jump-start the ragtime revival. He gave notice of his attraction to classical ragtime as well as stride piano and boogie-woogie not only in his own music but in a remarkable recording of the complete works of Scott Joplin. At the same time his fascination with many aspects of the contemporary scene was reflected in numerous first performances and commissions of organ and piano pieces by other composers, both American and European.

This pervasive interest in popular idioms in much of his “serious” music led him naturally to a fascination with the classical saxophone, and his admiration for his colleague at Michigan, Donald Sinta, clearly stood behind much of the work that he later composed for the instrument. Numerous commissions followed, many by students of Sinta, and in his role as mentor to the PRISM Quartet he encouraged the ensemble to concentrate on expanding the saxophone repertoire. Three members of PRISM attended the University of Michigan during the twenty-eight years that Bill was on the faculty; one, Matt Levy, studied composition with him; and and all felt the impact of Albright’s guidance and counsel. Levy summed it up: “Albright was instrumental in raising performnce standards for the concert saxophone. His works challenge the player’s technical ability and musicality. When PRISM first began performing together, he encouraged us to perform more demanding repertoire than the existing pool of primarily French conservatory works. His encouragement in no small part led us to commission an extensive body of repertoire unique to PRISM.”

The remarkable disc of Albright’s principal works for saxophone that PRISM has recorded here offers powerful testimony to the full range of his personality and his fascination with the expressive range of the instrument. Further evidence of his attraction to the instrument can also be found in his inclusion of the saxophone in other mixed chamber works such as Valley of Fire for saxophone quartet and organ of 1989 and Rustles of Spring for flute, alto saxophone, violin, cello, and piano of 1994.

The Fantasy Etudes were written In 1992 in response to a grant from Chamber Music America for a major new saxophone quartet for PRISM. Albright has contributed a lengthy and revealing portrait of the set:

The Work was written with the virtuoso solo and chamber music abilities of PRISM in mind. In addition, many of the movements were intentionally conceived “against type,” that is, inspired by sounds not usually associated with the saxophone, or, at least, the “polite” saxophone. American jazz, one can note, is a constant presence.

The first movement, a prelude to the “etudes,” is a mere index: it runs through the prime material of each of the six movements in rapid order. The prelude begins with a six note chant (DCEDCB), a melody each note of which foretells the principle tonal level of an etude.

The title of Etude Nr. 1, “A Real Nice Number,” was inspired by a story involving two of my former publishers. The Scene: the music publishing firm of Elkan-Vogel, downtown Philadelphia. The Time: the early sixties. The personae: Adolph Vogel, president, and Denise Jobert, his counterpart from Editions Jobert in Paris. Vogel is the USA representative of Jobert; the latter’s distinguished catalogue includes much of the original editions of Debussy’s best-known music. The two publishers meet for the first time, Vogel, a gruff tin pan alley type, speaking no French, and Mme Jobert, a proper and cultured French woman, speaking little English. Silence...an awkward moment...then Vogel breaks the ice, slaps her on the knee and blurts, “You know Clair de lune, that’s a real nice number!” My own “real nice number” is, in part, a tribute to Debussy’s music, the feline quality of which has always fascinated me.

Etude Nr. 2, “Pypes,” was inspired by Highland Bagpipe music, especially the highly ornamented variation form called “Pibroch.” The subsections of the movement are denoted as follows: “Sleeping pypes”...“Snapping pypes”....”Yakketing pypes”...“Clanking pypes”...“Heralding pypes”...“Steamy pypes”...“Wailing pypes”...“Horning pypes.”

Etude Nr. 3, “The Fives for Steve,” is dedicated to the memory of the composer Stephen Albert, tragically killed at the end of 1992 in an auto accident. His was a voice stilled long before it should have been. The piece is based on structures of five, for example, a meter of 5/4 and constant quintuplet beat divisions. “The Fives” is also the title of one of the very earliest boogie-woogie solos, though my piece has nothing to do with this style of piano playing.

“Phantom Galop,” Etude Nr. 4, was inspired by all kinds of signal sounds: train whistles, factory whistles, diesel horns, ocean liners, tug boats, shofars, and so on. The middle section takes its vocal cadence from an imaginary train conductor. It ends with the sounds emanating from the flocks of Canadian geese that fly over my house in Michigan each fall.

“Harmonium Fantasy (Heiliger Dankgesang)” Etude Nr. 5, was inspired by my childhood experiences of playing large console pump organs (presumably from the 1890’s) in the homes of my relatives in rural Illinois. I was always fascinated by the threshold of air-to-tone that could be controlled by different kinds of foot-pumping, the morose sagging effects as the wind died, and all kinds of “music between the cracks” that this once popular and fragile instrument could produce. [Ed. note: Bill’s parenthetical title “Heiliger Dankgesang” obviously refers to the chorale-like 3^rd mvt. of Beethoven’s string quartet, op. 132.]

Lastly, Etude Nr. 6, “They Only Come Out at Night,” is a finale-like romp through various kinds of commercial music, and in that I confess to being a child of the fifties, influenced by that decade’s mystery and detective shows and by the big band music that was married to them.

Timothy McAllister also shares the following memories regarding this virtuoso set:

In working with him on the etudes, Bill once told me that Etude 2, “Pypes,” could be heard as “an imaginary set of bagpipes coming to life or awakening from its sleep” then, later, “springing a leak” (as noted in the score) and imploding upon itself. Further, it is an exploration of all the possible types of sounds associated with ‘pipes’: exhaust pipes, radiator pipes, water pipes…and the saxophone itself is obviously a type of pipe (closed-tubed and purely conical).

With Etude 3, he described a ‘mood’ associated with nocturnal ‘stillness’ or “the calm of a city in the hours before sunrise, where the streets are empty and the traffic lights blink ‘yellow.’

In Etude 4, an imaginary ‘ghost train’ traverses the countryside, passing sea-side villages, factory towns, shipping ports, etc. In the end, the train disappears in the distance while a flock of geese fly overhead (or were the grazing geese disturbed by the train’s proximity and flew away?)

It is of no little interest that Albright submitted the Fantasy Etudes for consideration for the Pulitzer Prize and considered it one of his best compositions, something of which we are very proud.

The score of the Fantasy Etudes bares the inscription “Dedicated to Gygory Ligeti.” Why Ligeti? There can be little that doubt Albright’s admiration for the latter’s dazzling series of etudes for solo piano accounts for the dedication. The original designation of his saxophone etude set as Book I in the initial engraving (but later removed by C.F. Peters) also suggests that, like Ligeti, Albright planned a Book II of six more etudes for saxophone quartet. Albright’s further connection to Ligeti was confirmed in my presence on the occasion of a visit of the Hungarian composer to Ann Arbor in the early 1990s. During that time Ligeti actually composed a new piano etude in Bill’s studio at the school as part of his ongoing set of virtuoso pieces now known to all pianists. I remember Albright’s joy in showing an autographed and dated copy of the work with an inscription to the effect that it was “Composed in William Albright’s studio, Ann Arbor.” Anyone familiar with the luminescent virtuosity of Albright’s own “Five Chromatic Dances” for piano would have understood the affinity and affection behind his own dedication of these etudes to Ligeti.

Timothy McAllister, soprano saxophone; Michael Whitcombe, alto saxophone; Matthew Levy, tenor saxophone; and Taimur Sullivan, baritone saxophone.

Heater: Saga for Saxophone and Band was commissioned for the renowned saxophone virtuoso, Donald Sinta, by one of his students and for the Wappinger’s Falls High School Band. Taking its name from the gangster era slang term for a machine gun, Heater reflects Albright’s signature combination of contemporary harmonic language spiced with jazz idioms of the 1920s and 30s. The listener will recognize the sounds of a gunfight imitated by a series of percussions volleys that build steadily to the end of the piece. Sinta has commented that “Bill wants the snare drummers to ‘waste’ the saxophone at the close . . . so no holds barred.”

Taimur Sullivan, alto saxophone, with the University of Michigan Symphony Band, H.Robert Reynolds, conductor.

Pit Band for alto saxophone, bass clarinet, and piano was composed for Tom Bergeron and the Western Chamber Players (OR) in 1993. Albright’s comments about the work emphasize his sense of theater in many of his concert pieces. Albright remarks that “Pit Band, with its unusual ensemble of three haphazard instruments—a pick-up band, attempts to digest an evening-long comedy in a few minutes. The program is as follows: Tune-up and Introduction (“three bells”), Overture, Opening Number, Vamps and Screams (“Nessun dorma”), Love Song, Waltz, alla Marcia, Fox-trot and Shimmeys, Finale.” Tim McAllister has also noted that “The influences range from rock ballads to recitative, and throughout one may hear the complementary sounds of the concert experience such as program ‘ruffling,’ squeaky chairs, coughs, and applause.” Albright’s parenthetical reference to Puccini’s Turandot (“Neussun’ dorma”) in “Vamps and Screams” immediately brings to mind a piece for piano left-hand that he wrote on my retirement in 1996 based on Puccini’s Tosca (“Vissi d’arte”) coupled with Gesualdo’s “Moro lasso.” Albright’s lexicon clearly includes the total inherited musical tradition.

Taimur Sullivan, alto saxophone, Michael Lowenstern, bass clarinet, Marilyn Nonken, piano.

Doo-Dah, written in 1975 and dedicated to Donald Sinta, provides a compendium of styles and textures for three alto saxophones. The title clearly proclaims its roots in American popular culture, including popular song, Southern gospel music, blues, and free jazz. While the opening five and a half minutes give only minimal evidence of an awareness of these resources, a joyous two minute romp ensues before returning to an essentially quiet and tonal music with only occasional skittish episodes that break through the essentially quiet, undulating quality of the opening. Timothy McAllister has noted that “The use of three alto saxophones provides for numerous stereophonic effects and a timbral unity that allows Albright to explore nuance at the most intimate level. The score calls for quartertones, multiphonics, and ‘growling’ while opening up at times to allow for improvisation.” Doo-Dah was commissioned by Ken Dorn and the Saxophone Service in 1975 and is dedicated to Donald Sinta.

Taimur Sullivan, Matthew Levy, and Michael Whitcombe, alto saxophones.

Albright’s Sonata for Alto Saxophone and Piano was written in 1984 for a consortium of three saxophone/piano duos, Laura Hunter/Brian Connelly, Donald Sinta/Ellen Weckler, and Joseph Wytko/Walter Cosand, with a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. The four movement work opens with a “Two-Part Invention” and continues with a “La follia nuova: A lament for George Cacioppo” and Scherzo “Will o’ the Wisp,” and concludes with a “Recitative and Dance.” The preponderance of Baroque designations (Invention, Lament, Recitative, etc.) signals that, despite the presence of a third movement Scherzo, Albright’s approach to the sonata is here based upon an attraction to pre-classic forms and textures. Albright thought that the second movement, a lament dedicated to the memory of the composer George Cacioppo who died unexpectedly on April 8, 1984, deserved special comment.

“Co-founder of the ONCE group and mentor to two generations of composers, Cacioppo and his music and personality rest at the foundation of my thinking. He would have very much appreciated the use of the traditional title “La follia” (the madness) in my reincarnation as “La follia nuova.” Like its Baroque antecedents, the movement is in a chaconne-variation form, although at one point the sections jumble together, or intersect. The fact that the key is F# minor may be important, or it may not be.”

For those too young to remember, the ONCE group was a extraordinarily prominent avant-garde Ann Arbor group that achieved international notoriety for several seasons in the 1960s, and Cacioppo was the gentle counselor and guide not only for the group but for numerous musicians who came to know him. Finally, however, Albright’s Sonata provides lasting testimony not only to an important contemporary mentor but to an abiding interest in historical models in addition to a fascination with new adventures for the virtuoso alto saxophonist.

Matthew Levy, alto saxophone, with Matthew Herskowitz, piano.