Fred Glesser, live performances 1978-1998

Contraforte for double bass, piano

Etch

Unknown Album (11/28/2010 4:33:41 PM)

Summer Nights Passing

Wait For Me

Availability: published by Falls House Press www.fallshousepress.com

Recordings: no commercial recording (archival recording available for perusal) preview clip here

Program Notes: The Sonata was written between June 1982 and February 1984. The piece uses the classic fast-slow-fast structure for its three separate movements. The first movement makes extensive use of quarter-tone pitches and harmonics in the flute part, making it sometimes sound out-of-tune with the piano. The second movement is one of the earliest examples where this composer started to become concerned with spacing of musical events. Notice the pacing and occasional long gaps between events in this movement. The composer had, as a flutist, worked on or performed many of the great 20th century compositions for flute and piano (i.e., Piston, Prokofiev, Poulenc, Hindemith) and trios showcasing the flute (i.e., Debussy, Rorem) prior to the conception of this piece. No doubt the influence of these masterworks is reflected here, perhaps especially in the third movement. All pitch material in this movement is derivative of the opening arpeggiated gesture of the piano.

First Performance: Full premiere at The Art and Culture Center in Hollywood, Florida (May 1987) with Kirk Evan-Billet (flute) and Mary Kauffman (piano).

Other Performances: NYC premiere at the Tenri Cultural Institute (June 9, 2017) with Lisa Hansen (flute) and Max Lifchitz (piano).

West Coast premiere on a “Sounds New” Concert, Unitarian Universalist Church of Berkeley in Kensington, CA (March 12, 2006) with Deborah Schmidt (flute) and Herb Bielawa (piano).

“New Directions” Concert with The Tampa Bay Composers Forum in St. Petersburg, FL (Jan 1999) with Patricia Dominowski (flute) and Peter Blauvelt (piano).

Loyola University in New Orleans, LA (March 1987); partial performance.

University of Georgia in Athens, GA (April 1985); partial performance.

University of Miami in Coral Gables, FL (Nov 1983); partial performance.

Sonata for flute and piano

Unknown album (11/20/2021 12:07:29 PM)

Summer Nights Passing (Version for Flute & Piano Reduction)

Unknown album (12/16/2021 10:58:22 AM)

Be Also Ready

Unknown album (12/27/2021 3:27:15 PM)

Piano Trio No. 2

The title of this score for flute and harp refers simply to the name of the street where I now live, near Asheville and the beautiful Appalachian mountains of western North Carolina. Everyday, I imagine my music studio at this home as a sort of “portal” to both the outside world, and my own inner world. For me, this portal to both worlds helps to bring meaning, possibility, and hope into otherwise confusing and chaotic worlds (both inner and outer). I compose for self-clarity. Musically, “On Balsam High” was inspired by my adoration of both the flute and the harp, and the combination of these two instruments. First Performance: Aug 1, 2024 with Linda Cykert (flute) and Helen Rifas (harp) at the Jackson County Historic Courthouse in Sylva, NC

On Balsam High

Written for The Patchwork Suite, a classical and contemporary music podcast produced by WGTE Public Media, an NPR affiliate station in Northwest Ohio. This short piece for flute and harp is in the format of a theme and variations. The theme was written by the composer/ guitarist Catherina Pratten (1824-1895) and is first introduced here by the solo harp. The three brief variations that follow continue to alter the melody, rhythm, harmony, and tempo.

Pratten Variations on a Theme

Composer Frederic Glesser (b. 1956) grew up near Toledo, Ohio, where his early musical influences were rock, jazz, and music of the Baroque era. He studied jazz with Gene Parker and had flute studies with Kay Hartsfeld. He was later educated at Kent State University (BMus) in Ohio where he studied composition with James Waters and David Stewart, and studied flute with Raymond DeMattia and Maurice Sharp (former principal flutist, Cleveland Orchestra). His graduate studies where undertaken at the University of Miami (MMus) in Florida where he studied composition with Dennis Kam. Glesser has also been artist-in-residence at the Atlantic Center for the Arts with Pulitzer Prize-winner Donald Martino.

Glesser’s music has been presented at concert venues throughout the United States and Europe, Canada, Argentina, and Brazil; and festivals including Kent-Blossom (USA), JazzWeek (Netherlands), New Music North (Canada), Modern American Composers (Ukraine, Armenia), Subtropics (USA), and Frontwave (USA). Informed by a variety of musical genres, his resulting catalog is stylistically diverse. Included among the many performers who have presented his music are artists and groups such as pianists Max Lifchitz, Kathleen Supové, Mary Kauffman, and Michael Linville (New World Symphony), bassists Luis Gómez-Imbert and Mark Neuenschwander, percussionist Ingrid Gordon, flutists Rita D’Arcangelo, Iwona Glinka, Marie Schwartz, Lisa Hansen, and Tammy Phillips, the Delgani String Quartet, North/South Consonance, duo Ahlert-Schwab, Ibis Camerata, Hardwick Chamber Ensemble, Florida Symphony, Akron Youth Symphony, Canton Youth Orchestra, Wooster Symphony, and the Glass Orchestra. His compositions include works for small to medium ensemble, solo instrumental, and orchestra.

Select works are recorded on Albany, ERM Media, North/South, Zimbel Press, Phasma (Greece), and CDBaby.

Glesser currently resides near Asheville, North Carolina. His son Harrison lives in Asheville also, and his daughter Ashley now lives in Natick Massachusetts and works in downtown Boston.