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.