Forever Beeler

Album cover art for upc 896931003858
Label: Navona
Catalog: NV6085
Format: COMPACT DISC

Král, Jirí; Procházka, Dalibor; Janecek, Aleš; Kaucká, Lucie; Dvorák, Jan; Rojahn, Karolina; Bilan, Ladislav; Slowik, Jennifer; Hladík, Petr

Forever Beeler represents a sampling of composer Alan Beeler's prolific output throughout his musical career, which is generally defined by his commitment to compositional craft and structural clarity. The works featured on this album also reveal a playfulness lying just under the surface of Beeler's compositional perspective. This quality of Beeler's music is most notable in the seven sonatas for piano, often accompanied by another instrument, included in Forever Beeler. Here, Beeler crafts engaging conversations between the players at his disposal - he employs a great deal of imitative writing and a more roaming style than in the more concise works on this album. A particularly clear example of Beeler's flui sense of style occurs in the second movement of his Sonata for Clarinet and Piano, which is dominated by a subtle "swing" characteristic as well as the "cakewalk rhythm" popular in early twentieth century ragtime music. One of the most deeply intriguing works in Forever Beeler is the Three Early Pieces for Piano, which ranks among the first music Beeler formally composed and published. These short pieces exemplify the directness of Beeler's compositional voice, as they clearly develop and resolve a singula rmusical idea. In addition to being succinct, finely crafted piano miniatures, they stand as evidence to this album's unique offerings to listeners. It is extremely rare to have this kind of longitudinal representation of a composer's career available in an individual recording. The collection is even more valuable because, despite his indomitable and specific approach to composition, Beeler's oeuvre is filled with nuance, all of which stands out in Forever Beeler.

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