I DARE NOT ASK A KISS for soprano & piano Op. 7

GARY LLOYD NOLAND performs his NIGHT THOUGHTS for piano, Op. 127, No. 4. For more information on the composer, please visit his website at: garynolandcomposer.com

NIGHT THOUGHTS for piano, Op. 127, No. 4

REQUIESCAT for piano: in memoriam ART MADDOX (1940 - 2020)composed and performed by GARY LLOYD NOLAND. I collaborated with composer/pianist Art Maddox on a good number of projects when I lived in Eugene Oregon and after I moved to Portland. Art was a regular participant on my Seventh Species concert series from 1994 to 2007. Art was a brilliant musician with a powerful intellect and a warm and generous spirit. Art passed away in October, 2020. The music community of Oregon will never feel quite the same without him. I finally got around to composing this modest piece for piano in memory of Art (11:48 pm, January 18th, 2022). Requiescat in Pace Art Maddox. We miss you!

REQUIESCAT for piano: in memoriam ART MADDOX (1940 - 2020)

GARY LLOYD NOLAND performs his WILDWOOD REVERIE for piano. For more information on the composer, please visit his website at: garynolandcomposer.com

WILDWOOD REVERIE for piano

ABSINTHIAN PERFUMIGATIONS for piano, Op. 127, No. 1 performed by the composer. Rich, lush, and luxuriously decadent. Imagine, if you will, partaking of a sumptuous dessert in an elegant café whilst pipe-dreaming euphorically of a profusion of improbabilities, and then topping it off with an absinthe espresso.… For more information on Gary Lloyd Noland, please visit his website at: garynolandcomposer.com

ABSINTHIAN PERFUMIGATIONS for piano, Op. 127, No. 1

MUSICAL PORTRAIT OF DARRELL GRANT Op. 117, No. 11 (May 14th, 2022). This is the first in my series of musical portraits of an individual I don't happen to know as well as the ten others whose portraits I have composed (à la Virgil Thomson) in the past year and a half or so. I was asked by Bonnie Miksch, Professor of Composition at Portland State University, to compose a piece to honor her colleague, jazz pianist and composer Darrell Grant, whom I have not yet met at the time of this writing. I have  listened to excerpts of Darrell Grant's music and some talks of his online. Thus, this piece may be likened to a quick sketch as might be drawn by a portrait artist at a county fair or an amusement park (for naught but a pittance, if that). It is only a quick abstract impression, which might be totally off the mark. This, then, is a musical gesture to celebrate Darrell Grant's sixtieth birthday (May 30th, 2022). All best birthday wishes, Darrell Grant! Hope to meet you in the near future!

MUSICAL PORTRAIT OF DARRELL GRANT Op. 117, No. 11 (May 14th, 2022)

The PIMPLETON PROCRASTURBATION ENSEMBLE performs WITH ALL DUE DESPECT, YOUR SIR - REVERENCE… (Op. 133, No. 3) by GARY LLOYD NOLAND. For more information about the composer, please visit his website at: garynolandcomposer.com

WITH ALL DUE DESPECT, YOUR SIR - REVERENCE… (Op. 133, No. 3)

The PIMPLETON PROCRASTURBATION ENSEMBLE performs FLAMBIVALENCE (Op. 133, No. 1) by GARY LLOYD NOLAND. For more information on the composer, please visit his website at: garynolandcomposer.com

FLAMBIVALENCE (Op. 133, No. 1)

The PIMPLETON PROCRASTURBATION ENSEMBLE performs CEREMONIAL FANFARE FOR THE ROYAL WATERBUG BRIGADE (Op. 134, No. 3) by GARY LLOYD NOLAND. For more information on the composer, please visit his website at: garynolandcomposer.com

CEREMONIAL FANFARE FOR THE ROYAL WATERBUG BRIGADE (Op. 134, No. 3)

The PIMPLETON PROCRASTURBATION ENSEMBLE performs ENTROPIC DOMAIN OF APATHIZING BARNACLES AND THEIR IDEOLOGICAL BRETHREN (Op. 133, No. 6) by GARY LLOYD NOLAND. For more information on the composer, please visit his website at: garynolandcomposer.com

ENTROPIC DOMAIN OF APATHIZING BARNACLES AND THEIR IDEOLOGICAL BRETHREN (Op. 133, No. 6)

The PIMPLETON PROCRASTURBATION ENSEMBLE performs THE NATIVES ARE GROWING PSEUDOCIDAL by GARY LLOYD NOLAND. For more information on the composer, please visit his website at: garynolandcomposer.com

THE NATIVES ARE GROWING PSEUDOCIDAL

The PIMPLETON PROCRASTURBATION ENSEMBLE performs BLINDED MARE'S NEST OMELETTE (Op. 135, No. 1) by GARY LLOYD NOLAND. For more information on the composer, please visit his website at: garynolandcomposer.com

BLINDED MARE'S NEST OMELETTE (Op. 135, No. 1)

My FUNFARE FOR SANITY (Op. 129, July 1st, 2022) for brass quintet (two trumpets, horn, trombone). I started composing this piece in the early days of June, 2022 in anticipation of submitting it for consideration by a committee for a possible performance on a Cascadia Composers concert by a local brass quintet. After several days of intensive work in an effort to meet the deadline (which was about a week thereafter) I learned that I was ineligible to submit it on account of having already had a piece of mine performed on the previous Cascadia Composers concert a month earlier, which was just as well, since this quintet still needed work. I would have called it "FANFARE FOR SANITY" but didn't like the assonance in its title, thus: "FUNFARE," which is, perhaps, more evocative of its festive mood. I could be wrong, but assume that where one encounters "sanity," one also tends to encounter peace, harmony, and justice—all conditions of which are sorely needed in these troubled times. Prithee listen and enjoy!. Responses from listeners are more than welcomed. For more information on the composer, please visit his website at: garynolandcomposer.com

FUNFARE FOR SANITY for Brass Quintet (Op. 129)

The PIMPLETON PROCRASTURBATION ENSEMBLE performs ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS (Op. 131, No. 4) by GARY LLOYD NOLAND. For more information on the composer, please visit his website at: garynolandcomposer.com

ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS (Op. 131, No. 4)

GARY LLOYD NOLAND performs his UNFORSAKEN OBSESSIONS for piano (Op. 131, No. 8). For more information on the composer, please visit his website at: garynolandcomposer.com

UNFORSAKEN  OBSESSIONS for piano (Op. 131, No. 8)

GARY LLOYD NOLAND: "OLD BERKELEY" for piano, performed by the composer. One of my "COVIDITTIES" (Op. 116). This piece was composed in memory of my piano teacher Goodwin Sammel (1925-2020), whom I always thought of as a permanent fixture in Berkeley, California. Whenever visiting Berkeley from Portland I felt secure knowing of Goodwin's formidable musical presence in a house on Francisco Street, just west of Shattuck Avenue. Berkeley will never feel quite the same without him. The landscape of the world has changed dramatically in the past six months. Goodwin passed away in January, before this change occurred. Due to the current pandemic, it may no longer be possible for me to visit the town of my formative years. This piece expresses my sense of being in exile and also my nostalgic longing for a return to an era in history that has all but vanished before our eyes. Despite many historically negative connotations in reference to the emotional condition of nostalgia, I confess to it here without shame.

OLD BERKELEY

OLD BERKELEY for piano.  In memoriam Goodwin Sammel (1925-2020).

This is the fifteenth in a set of twenty pieces Op. 1 (1983). Performed by the composer.

TWO-PART INVENTION IN G MINOR for piano Op. 1, No. 15

Pianist Randall Hodgkinson performs HUMORESQUE Op. 3 by Gary Lloyd Noland (1985). This was recorded at the New England Conservatory in 1988. It appears on the CD SELECTED MUSIC FROM VENGE ART. For more information on composer Gary Lloyd Noland, please visit his website at: https://composergarynoland.godaddysites.com/

Selected Music From Venge Art

HUMORESQUE for piano Op. 3

Pianist Randall Hodgkinson performs RUSSELL STREET RAG Op. 5 by GARY LLOYD NOLAND. Composed when I was seventeen (1974), this piece is named after one of the streets I grew up on in Berkeley. At the time I wrote this piece the renowned historian Peter Robert Lamont Brown (who is regarded as the inventor of the field of Late Antiquity) was staying in the adjacent room of our house. He was out the door early every morning to the library and returned late at night after doing full days of research in his areas of expertise. I imagine that my banging this piece out on the piano (which was positioned against the wall adjacent to his room) must have driven him nuts whenever he happened to be in his room. During the year or so he stayed with us, I was impressed by the fact that he had a command of fourteen languages. I just read now that, over the years, he has picked up another twelve languages, bringing the total to 26 (!). I have rarely met such a dedicated scholar. Unbeknownst to Professor Brown, my having had the opportunity to witness, as an impressionable teenager, his daily routines taught me to adopt (or, at very least, to attempt to adopt) a similar work ethic in my composing, though, what with the MacArthur Fellowship and all the other accolades Brown has received over the years, I imagine his life is considerably less hindered by the kinds of distractions occasioned by a wholesale lack of interest in, and lack of support for, those dedicated to the art of music-making.

RUSSELL STREET RAG for piano Op. 5

Pianist Maria Choban performs SCHIZOMEZZO Op. 85 by Gary Lloyd Noland. To read more about the composer, please visit his website at: https://composergarynoland.godaddysites.com/

SCHIZOMEZZO for piano Op. 85

Soprano Nancy Wood and pianist Paul Safar perform I DARE NOT ASK A KISS (Op. 7) by Gary Lloyd Noland. Poem is "To Electra" by Robert Herrick (1591-1674).  This song may be performed with either piano or harpsichord accompaniment. For more information on the composer, please visit his website at: https://composergarynoland.godaddysites.com/

I DARE NOT ASK A KISS for soprano & piano (Op. 7)

Resides in Portland, Oregon. Grew up in Berkeley, CA. Born in Seattle.  PhD, Harvard. “Gary Noland is one of the great composers of the 21st century.”—JACK RUMMEL, KGNU 88.5 FM, Boulder CO, “...iconoclastic, stylistic potpourri standards of giddy humor, no holds barred soup to nuts and high spirits.”—ROBERT LEVIN, pianist, musicologist, composer, "...a fleet-fingered, ebullient performer ... bright, witty and engaging.”—CHRISTIAN CAREY, SPLENDID MAGAZINE, “...distinctive, inventive ... subversive ... You can hardly be indifferent to Noland’s music and so I would urge you to try it.” —ROGER BLACKBURN, MUSICWEB INTERNATIONAL, “...set in a dizzying harmonic language that loops uncontrollably through a wide-ranging gamut of possible and impossible tonalities ... The general effect is like watching wet paintings of 19th Century musical memorabilia drip into frazzled 21st Century oblivion...” —ALLEN GIMBEL, AMERICAN RECORD GUIDE, “Mr. Noland writes as a ‘time traveler’ in styles long abandoned by most composers as well as styles so new as to not have been imagined but by him. This he accomplishes naturally, convincingly, with originality and true passion. His command of all musical languages and his ability to traverse musical time is nothing less than remarkable. Listen!”—DONALD MARTINO, Pulitzer Prize winning composer, “...mind-bending spiraling of focus which is truly breathtaking ... spectacular...”—CHARLES AMIRKHANIAN, composer, sound poet & radio producer, “I'm amazed at your harmonic skill. Haven't seen or heard anything like it from any one else—except yours truly—certainly not from your generation. It falls somewhere between Strauss and Mahler. Especially like how you are able to slip in and out from the tonal to the atonal—or near atonal...”—GEORGE ROCHBERG, American composer, Pulitzer Prize finalist, “...court jester to the classical establishment...”—PAYTON MACDONALD, AMERICAN RECORD GUIDE, “...florid and juicy...” —RICHARD BUELL, THE BOSTON GLOBE, “...an incredible aural web ... a great ostinato of American kitsch. Sul pont never sounded so good.”—RUSSELL STEINBERG, composer, conductor of the LOS ANGELES YOUTH ORCHESTRA, “...I am bowled over by the expertise of your music: you use certain elements from the 19th century and from jazz, etc., and just at the moment when I am about to say, OK, what else is new?, you do a number of things, such as speeding up, becoming wildly dissonant, modulating to a distant continent, stopping completely and throwing some kind of total surprise ... you seem to know exactly when to do what and how much. I don’t know anybody else who can do it!” —ANDREW IMBRIE, American composer, Pulitzer Prize finalist, “... remarkable stuff...”
—MAX MORATH, American ragtime pianist, composer, actor & author, “...a loony composer from Oregon...” —MAX SHEA, WMUA 91.1FM, Amherst, MA, “Gary Noland is one of those 21st Century composers seeking to forge a new aesthetic based on older models that do not traffic in serialism or minimalism ... Zany waltzes, ragtime riffs, chorales, toccatas, and much else romp and tear through these depictions of superheroes and villains from his ‘chamber novels’; other pieces spoof serial music ... to grand operas ... and Jewish guilt.” —JACK SULLIVAN, AMERICAN RECORD GUIDE, “...Paranoid Ravel...”—ALEX DUNN, KZSU FM90.3, Stanford, CA, “...It’s a romantic romp, rhythmically robust yet melodically flirting with the nostalgia of cabaret, minus the sleazy diminution of spilled drinks and smelly ashtrays. Its elegance recalls Elgar, and the serious sides, a synthesis of those strange bedfellows Schubert and Ives. Composers hate it when their music reminds you of someone else’s, but writing within a tradition, Noland has incorporated divergent styles that, woven together, work. Cosmopolitan without snobbery, it’s intelligent, pleasurable and convincing.” —ROCKY LEPLIN, THE BERKELEY VOICE

I DARE NOT ASK A KISS for soprano & piano Op. 7

Gary Lloyd Noland, composer