Product Description
I have a love-hate relationship with the Cesar Franck D Minor Symphony.
It was the first large scale romantic work that I played as a member of a
youth orchestra. I remember the thrill of being immersed in the
overwhelming drama of the work. As I have returned to the piece over the
years, I still love it, or rather I love parts of it. It is a very,
very long work. It takes a while to get to the point. The point of the
piece, to me, is the last movement. It is fast, exciting, maybe even
joyous. The long, dark, angst-ridden build-up seemed profound to me as a
teenager. I am less patient today. Now I wish Franck had simply started
with the last movement.
I decided to try rewriting the symphony myself. I would start with
material from the last movement. I would use all of the basic musical
material of the piece, but I would condense it down to ten to fifteen
minutes of music. I had originally intended to leave the romantic
character of the work intact. That intention didn't last very long. As I
worked on the piece, it very quickly became more post-modern than
romantic. I think that's fine. The profundity may be gone, but I think
the piece is more fun this way. As I get older the scales of my life are
tipping more and more toward fun and less and less toward profundity.
It's kind of nice that, as I age, I see more fun ahead me even if that
means I'm seeing profundity recede in the rear-view mirror.
This product was created by a member of ArrangeMe, Hal Leonard's global self-publishing community of independent composers, arrangers, and songwriters. ArrangeMe allows for the publication of unique arrangements of both popular titles and original compositions from a wide variety of voices and backgrounds.