Recorded at my 1953 recital at Notre Dame High School in Quincy, Illinois

Toccata No. 11 From Trois Pieces - Poulenc

0:00  100 Views of Mt. Fuji: 100 Pieces in 100 Minutes–Homage to Hokusai, "Spring" - Robert J. Martin | Shirley Blankenship

www.ravellorecords.com/catalog/rr7909/

On their debut Ravello Records release, PLAYFUL EDGE OF THE WAVE, composers Robert J. Martin and Neely Bruce join a love of beauty with the willingness to engage in spirited, magical, even outrageously unexpected sounds and gestures. These composers, with pianist Shirley Blankenship, present a collection of image-based works whose titles and descriptions open a direction to understanding the music.

Martin presents 100 Views of Mt. Fuji: 100 Pieces in 100 Minutes–Homage to Hokusai, a series of short evocations of Hokusai’s woodcuts of Mt. Fuji, each different in its gestures and language, yet all in the same universe. This work exemplifies the concept of image-based music, each piece’s title offering a vision for the music. In his Improvisations, Bruce reveals the gentle and mesmerizing side of contemporary non-traditional harmonies. In Homage to Seb, the composer presents an amazingly atonal and pleasingly modern side of Johann Sebastian Bach. The collection ends with Martin's stone & feather, an exploration of timbre, lightness, and heaviness. The images found in the pieces’ titles and descriptions are keys to the music, allowing the listener to unlock a door between the abstract and the concrete, between the composer and the audience member, and to discover a vivid world that is captivating and new.

Robert J. Martin / Neely Bruce - PLAYFUL EDGE OF THE WAVE

This piece was performed at Nature's Table at a Guido Sinclair gig.  As part of the evening, he presented  Concert in Miniature performed by Ellen Finch-flutist  and Shirley Blankenship-harpist. 

Phantasy Haru No Umi for flute and harp - Josef Molnar

Sagileo was composed and performed by Guido Sinclair, saxophonist.  It was recorded at the Blind Pig by The Guido Connection:
Shirley Meyer Blankenship - violin
Mark Zanter - guitar

Sagileo  - A Dorothy Martirano Transcription Of Guido's  Performance

A two-movement work for clarinet, harp, and double bass.

Kelevsma

Vocal performance
 Recital at Notre Dame High School
Quincy, Illinois 1953
Shirley Meyer (Blankenship) - soprano
Joan Becker - piano accompanist

The Nightingale's Song Op.28 No.4 - Nevin

Piano Rock Album. Five pieces inspired by popular piano styles. 1) Broken Windows 2) Logical Temperature 3) Napoleon at Junior's 4) Louis Chauvin Surveys the Current State of Affairs 5) Mack the Fork Recorded in performance. "This Is It!" No. 7 — The Complete Piano Works of Neely Bruce. Crowell Concert Hall, Wesleyan University, Sunday 1 November 2015 at 3:00 p.m. 

Broken Windows [Piano Rock Album No. 1]

This Is It! #10 The complete piano music of Neely Bruce, recorded by the composer. There are 39 variants, in Chopin's own hand, of passages in the famous E flat major nocturne, Op. 9 No. 2. (And others have been discovered since the publication of these 39.) I have made variants of the variants. 88 slips of paper are shuffled and played in the resulting order. There are an astronomical number of possible versions of this piece. This version (one of 88!) was performed on Sunday 25 September, 2016, in Crowell Concert Hall at Wesleyan University.

Furniture Music in the Form of 39 Chopin Variants

Orchestration by John Driscoll (https://soundcloud.com/driscollmusick) of original piece by Mariza Costa-Cabral. The choice of all instruments is John's, as well as all richness of musical details, and the midi and sound files.

I wrote this piece for my husband.

The accompanying image was found on the internet without attribution.

I trust you like a flying trapezist - by Mariza Costa-Cabral, orchestrated by John Driscoll

"This Is It!" #17. The final recital of the complete piano works of Neely Bruce, recorded in concert Sunday 31 March 2019. This sonata was begun in the late 1960s when I was in graduate school at the University of Illinois. At that time I practiced the Boulez First Piano Sonata on a regular basis. I also worked on the Boulez Sonatine for flute and piano (with Tom Howell), and Structures Two for two pianos (with Joe Dechario). I wrote about a third of it and didn't work on it again until 1993-94, when I completed it. In addition to the strong influence of the piano writing of Boulez, it is modeled on the various one-movement sonatas of Scriabin.

Sonata No. 5

Penumbra for String Quartet.  Performed here by the sadly now defunct Cordova Quartet.

Penumbra for String Quartet

Dr. Shirley Meyer Blankenship initially began performing with the Champaign-Urbana Symphony Orchestra as a violinist when she was a student and Bernard Goodman was the conductor. Throughout the years she has played viola and keyboards as well as the harp. Currently, Shirley is the principal harpist.

Dr. Blankenship was the first woman to receive a Doctorate of Musical Arts degree in composition from the University of Illinois. Among her compositions are: Chansons Innocentes, Visions and Revisions, Terse Trio, The Trees Stand, It’s Always Ourselves We Find, Christmas Images, Metaphysical Waltz, Sagileo, Be Careful, The Squirrel, Duo for Violin and Cello, and Fantasy Stuck.

In addition to her participation in the Symphony and the creation of new works, Shirley has been active in local theaters as an accompanist, music director, violinist, harpist, and actress. These theaters include The Station Theater, The Champaign-Urbana Theater Company, The Sunshine Dinner Playhouse, Parkland College, Artco in Tuscola, and Little Theater On The Square in Sullivan. At The Station Theater, she was music director and accompanist for two Menotti operas: The Medium and The Telephone. At the University of Illinois, Shirley performed The Fantastiks (harp) and She Loves Me (violin) with Thomas Schleiss, music director and accompanist. In the summer of 2010, she was the accompanist for the musical Honk performed in Tuscola.

For the past 10 years, she has been a collaborator with composer Robert Martin. In 2008, Shirley recorded his composition, The Owl and The Pussycat, for harp and flute, with Amanda Pond, flutist. This recording is now included in an album titled Metamorphosis and can be located online here. In 2010, she completed the recording of 100 piano pieces comprising Martin’s Mt. Fuji project.

Dr. Blankenship is a member of The American Harp Society, Composer’s Forum, and The Society of Composers, Inc. On her page on the Forum website is posted a recent article concerning compositional issues she has encountered in the works of Jolivet, Brün, Haken, Martin, Berg, Rouse, Baxter, and Rands. She is currently a professional international editor/consultant for composers writing new music for the harp.

Her ongoing autobiography, Polarities, documents her career in the arts as a musician, actress, and teacher, as well as her personal life struggles.

Shirley’s teaching website is available at www.shirleymeyerblankenship.com, and her papers and archived musical works are held in The Sousa Archives and Center for American Music. Her new website, The Harp Legacy Project, promotes awareness of issues in composition of new music for the harp.

Sagileo - A Dorothy Martirano Transcription Of Guido's Performance

drshirley

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