Down the Road: Chamber Music for Saxophone & Piano

Description

INTRODUCTION
Down the Road is a project born in a heterogeneous way over the years and developed through many recordings made in different and significant places where we had the opportunity to visit thanks to our musical activity.  The majority of the compositions were written by contemporary composers who have collaborated and still collaborate with us and come to constitute a sort of personal musical journey through the beauty of these music filtered by our passion and memories.

A GUIDE TO LISTENING

Lorenzo Ferrero
A night in Nashville
There is a street, in the center of Nashville, a city of musicians, with a sequence of nightclubs where country music is performed and one can have a good beer. Getting nearer, one hears fragments of music more and more clearly, until one enters a brouhaha full of styles and influences and listens to the performance of unknown and enthusiastic virtuosos. This piece is a kind of description of this experience, led by the memory of “Take me home, country roads”, and it is dedicated to Eddie Schwartz, who wrote many famous songs between Toronto and Nashville.

Patrizio Marrone
Improvvisamente
This work exemplifies a musical fabric made of daring melodic lines and rhythmical designs, seemingly improvised, but unfolding, in the listener’s ears, with surprising pleasurableness upon a structured and balanced harmonic support. The two instruments face, in a classical ternary form, a complicated – and at the same time fascinating – musical itinerary. It alternates between virtuoso technique (there is, among others, an interesting solo by the sax) and unexpected, softer atmospheres, thanks to the skillful transformation of the initial theme, whose almost jazz-like flavor infuses the piece with befittingly modern notes.

Carlo Galante
Eumenidum Crines, Five Lyric Fragments
Eumenidum crines solo movere furores (“The locks of the Eumenides produced madness alone”), it is stated in Book Nine of Pharsalia, the marvelous and ferocious poem by the Latin poet Lucan. I was electrified by the spasmodic tension of the language of this poem, which seemingly prefigures a kind of ante-litteram expressionism. It is a strident and strained language, which, at the same time, sounds with exceeding elegance. These traits, combined with the melancholic and suspended feeling proper to archaism, invited me to write a stylized music, though one full of contrasts; mobile, yet with cast-iron (though unbalanced) geometries. In these five fragments, the musical figurations are always aggressive; they stand out and frequently clash ruthlessly with each other, producing a music which is often impulsive, with an unquiet and broken melos. The “modern” sound of the soprano sax, clear though slightly raucous, is perfect in order to create something “ancient” but so close to us. The five fragments bear the following indications: mosso e agitato; rapido; adagio; molto più mosso; rapido e risoluto.

Vincenzo Palermo
Canto gemello
This piece breaths a suffused and delicately nocturnal atmosphere, in the form of a Song without Words, whose title is inspired by the ancient “Gymel”. Similar to it, is presents at its beginning the piece’s main theme, which proceeds in parallel among the two instruments, in a tense melodic élan. Originally conceived for alto saxophone, it was purposefully adapted for various instruments: baritone saxophone, clarinet (bot in A and in B-flat), and eventually for four-hands piano duet.
Luigi Del Prete
Habanera
This piece has a simple and tripartite structure. Taking the rhythmical substrate typical for the famous Cuban dance as a its reference, the piece offers a version of it attempting to find an interaction between South-American melodic seductiveness and the Italian (or rather Neapolitan) belcanto singing style. It operates a melodic and timbral fusion filtered through the abundance of harmonics and the “vocal” warmth of the soprano sax. The result is a composition centered on a rather expressive than technical kind of performance virtuosity. The melodic aspect merges with the harmonic one, proposing modal scales reminiscent of an idea of archaic folk-like simplicity, which is represented (especially in the central section of the piece) by the use of the Lydian mode. The piano, even in the simplicity of its exposition, does not appear to be a mere spectator; rather, it contributes to the musical discourse with melodic moments in counterpoint with the sax’s melody; in some cases, they nuance it with “tirades” or with arpeggios of open chords.

Armando Ghidoni
Flashnotes
This piece aims at uniting various aspects of the sonority and musicality of the sax and of the piano. Flashnotes, in fact, is conceived and structured with the purpose of putting both instrument under the spotlight; there is not a unique solo instrument, the saxophone, “accompanied” by the piano. In so doing, both instrumentalists have the role of “soloists”, in a musical blend where the feeling of the duo is particularly intense. Moving from classical to jazz-like sounds, the piece highlights the musical characteristics of the saxophone, an instrument which is best known in jazz music, but also the features of the piano, an instrument employed in all kinds of musical styles. The captivating melody is sustained by an intense harmony, which acquires momentum in the pressing rhythm of the piece’s final section.

Sandro Fazzolari
Sonata No. 4 Op. 14 No. 1
A single movement, full of aural colours which employ some extended saxophone techniques: tone-bending, pizzicato, multiphonics, circular breathing and flutter tongue. In a virtuoso tour de force, very demanding for both the saxophonist and the pianist, this piece encompasses two main musical ideas: a transformed waltz and a syncopated jazz-theme. The piece opens with a mysterious introduction representing mist, clouds and dreams. Both ideas are developed through extensions and novel transfigurations of a high dramatic power, along with long and tender phrases which are played pianissimo. The piece closes with a solo-saxophone cadenza which offers a last occasion for development, before the piano’s reappearance with a repeated note, delineating the time which is about to run out, dying out in the melancholy of its closing.

Lodi Luka
Changing
Built on the continuing metamorphosis of the musical material, this piece opens with a section with a lyrical character, a jazz-like flavor and a slight melancholy. An intermediate section entrusted to the piano leads us to the piece’s second part, with a very rhythmical and brilliant character. A noteworthy contrast with the initial part is reached, entering an atmosphere rich in influences from pop and Balkan music. The work creates a kaleidoscopic effect and closes with a bright finale in a climax of energy.