Elliott Carter: Enchanted Preludes [with score]

One of my absolute favourite pieces: Carter's Enchanted Preludes for flute and cello, composed in 1988. Performed here by Harvey Solberger and Fred Sherry.
Note: this is a re-upload; there was a slight fault with the original one.

Composer's notes:
Enchanted Preludes is a birthday present for Ann Santen, commissioned by her husband, Harry, and composed in gratitude for their enthusiastic and deeply caring support of American music. It is a duet for flute and cello in which the two instruments combine their different characters and musical materials into statements of varying moods. The title comes from a poem of Wallace Stevens: The Pure Good of Theory, "All the Preludes to Felicity," stanza no.7:

Felicity, ah! Time is the hooded enemy,
The inimical music, the enchanted space
In which the enchanted preludes have their place.

The score was given its first performance by Patricia Spencer, flute, and André Emelianoff, cello, of the Da Capo Chamber Players in New York, on May 16, 1988.

--Elliott Carter

Category:

Music

Tags:

• elliott
• carter