Description
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J9ZfS49HaPc
"This new and expanded work for chamber ensemble received its title, 'Music of Amber', from the last stanza of the same poem. As is the case with From a Dark Millennium, piano (although not amplified in the chamber version), is the central timbre of the work: ". . . the piano presents the primary melodic, gestural, harmonic and sonoric elements supported by the percussion. "Compared with the version for large wind ensemble which uses five percussionists, the sextet version has all of the percussion parts performed by a single musician. This new chamber work was premiered in New York in 1981 and was subsequently entered in the Kennedy Center Friedheim competition. Selected as a finalist, Schwantner asked the New York New Music Ensemble to go to Washington, D.C. and perform the piece at the finals concert. A panel of distinguished adjudicators announced at the conclusion of the event that Music ofAmber was the first prize winner, thus receiving the 1981 Kennedy Center Friedheim Award for excellence in chamber composition."
From:
Popejoy, James. From a Dark Millennium Comes the Music of Amber: A Comparative Study of Two Works by Joseph Schwantner, dissertation, August 2000; Denton, Texas.
New York New Music Ensemble · Joseph Schwantner · Robert Black
Movements:
0:00 Movement 1
7:40 Movement 2