This fall I was fortunate to be able to go on a brief recital tour, performing the same program three times in one week at the University of Louisiana Monroe, Arkansas State University, and the University of Central Arkansas. Videos from the final performance at UCA can be found at the end of this post. THANK YOU to my collaborator, Justin Havard, as well as our hosts Juli Buxbaum and the Arkansas State University Horn Studio and Brent Shires and the University of Central Arkansas Horn Studio. It’s been a while since I did a strictly horn and piano recital, and this program was tremendously fun to put together and perform. I’m pretty happy with these videos, although I set the camera up a little too close, resulting in a more direct sound than the hall actually had. It was a lovely, resonant space. Here’s the list of works, along with the videos and some program notes sourced largely from the composers’ websites and publishers of their music.

Lauren Bernofsky (b. 1967), Two Latin Dances

Lauren Bernofsky’s catalog includes solo, chamber and choral music as well as larger-scale works for orchestra, film, musical, opera, and ballet. Her music has been performed across the United States, Europe, and Asia, as well as in Australia, New Zealand, Greece, Iceland, Norway, Brunei, Kenya, and South Africa. She holds degrees from the Hartt School, New England Conservatory, and Boston University. Her philosophy of composition is simple: music should be a joy both to play and to hear. Bernofsky’s works have been commissioned by the Harford Ballet, the Bloomington Symphony Orchestra, the Delmar Trio, Jeffrey Curnow (Philadelphia Orchestra), and many others. Her works are published by Boosey & Hawkes, The FJH Music Company, Balquhidder Music, Fatrock Ink, Hal Leonard, Grand Mesa Music, Alfred Publishing, Wingert-Jones, Carl Fischer, and Theodore Presser, and can be heard on the Polarfonia, Albany, Music to My Ears, Blue Griffin, MSR Classics, and Emeritus labels. – Information from laurenbernofsky.com. Commissioned by trombonist Natalie Mannix, Two Latin Dances is a beautifully evocative and sizzling work based on Bossa Nova and Tango rhythms. While at first sounding as two distinct movements, the characteristic dances gradually intertwine to create a uniquely integrated and ever-building whole. This arrangement for horn and piano by the composer.

Edith Borroff (1925-2019) , Sonata for Horn and Piano

Edith Borroff received her education at Oberlin Conservatory, the American Conservatory of Music, and the University of Michigan. She became the contemporary music critic for the Ann Arbor News in 1966. She authored the book Three American Composers (Pub. Univ Press of America, 1986) which traces the power shift from the apprentice/conservatory system of training composers to the university system, which took place in the United States from 1925 to 1975. In addition to her renown as a composer, Dr. Borroff taught at several colleges and universities, including SUNY-Binghamton, where she spent the bulk of her career. Her areas of research centered on 17th-century French chamber music, American and contemporary music, music education, and pre-history. Borroff  authored numerous books including the first history of music to include African-American composers. Edith Borroff’s papers are housed in the Newberry Library in Chicago, and include her writings, musical compositions, correspondence, research materials, and lectures as musicologist and composer. – Information from composers.com/composers/edith-borroff The Sonata for Horn and Piano is idiomatic for both instruments, and the four movements (Rhapsody, Scherzo, Sarabande, and Estampie) move backwards in time, representing musical periods from the Medieval to Romantic eras. The composer describes the movements as differing in mood as well as form and the writing is tonal and melodic. The lush first movement is contrasted with the light, jocular second. The stately Sarabande is followed by the 14th-century round dance, Estampie. Borroff’s Sonata was premiered by Nancy Becknell, horn with Borroff, piano at Northwestern University in 1955. Cynthia Carr, horn recorded the work with Julie Nishimura, piano on Images: Music for Horn and Piano by Women Composers (self-produced). – Notes by Lin Foulk Baird,linfoulk.org

Shanyse Strickland (b. 1991), When I’m Older

Anthony Plog (b. 1947) Horn Sonata

Anthony Plog has had a rich and varied international career in music – as a composer of operas, symphonic music, and chamber works; as an orchestral musician, soloist, and recording artist – and as a brass teacher and coach at some of the great music conservatories internationally and now online to students around the world. His music has been performed in over 30 countries, and he has been the recipient of numerous grants and commissions. After beginning his career writing extensively for brass, he now works in many different musical forms. He has composed three children’s operas, the first of which (How the Trumpet Got Its Toot) was premiered by the Utah Opera and Symphony. He completed a major tragic opera (Spirits) based on a Holocaust theme and recently finished a new opera about a drone operator suffering a nervous breakdown (The Sacrifice). Other new works include an oratorio about the first major environmental battle in the United States (God’s First Temples), in versions for orchestra, symphonic band, and soprano song cycle; and a cantata using the stories of women who have recovered from sex trafficking, prostitution, and drug abuse (Magdalene). Plog lives and works in Freiburg, Germany. – Information from anthonyplog.com/about/biography Plog’s Horn Sonata was commissioned through a consortium led by Matthew C. Haislip of Mississippi State University. The sonata is written in two parts, each comprising two movements attacca. The composer skillfully varies passages that highlight the sonority and singing character of the horn with more virtuosic and agitated passages. He maintains a dramatic dynamism throughout the entire work, thanks in part to a piano part that not only punctuates and accompanies, but also plays its own full role. 
– Information from editions-bim.com