I was super excited to give two recitals in the past two months: my first solo faculty recital at the University of Maryland and a guest artist recital at Howard University in DC. Both were in collaboration with my good friend, Sophia Kim Cook. The program at UMD (11/19/2018) focused on more modern bassoon music and two of the four pieces were unaccompanied. Modern music has always been an interest of mine and it’s something that I plan on doing more of in the near future.
Martial Solal’s Seul contre tous was the program opener and contains many extended techniques: flutter-tonguing, multiphonics, and singing while playing. Before the intermission was Libby Larsen’s Concert Piece for Bassoon and Piano. With it’s jazzy riffs it seemed like a natural pairing with Solal’s piece. After a brief break came Karlheinz Stockhausen’s In Freundschaft. Originally written in 1977 for clarinet, Stockhausen arranged it for bassoon in 1982. Composed of five “limbs” or sections, it stretches the listener’s ear. Listen for the motivic material repeated in all twelve keys and watch for the “unexpected action” in the middle of the piece. Last on the program was André Jolivet’s fiendishly difficult Bassoon Concerto.
The recital at Howard University (1/17/2019) was more accessible than the one at UMD and started off with one of my favorite bassoon solo pieces: Camille Saint-Saëns’ Bassoon Sonata. This is a classic of the repertoire and always a joy to perform. Second on the program was my teacher, William Winstead’s, Second Operatic Anthology which contains arias from Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro, Verdi’s La Traviata, Saint-Saëns’ Samson and Delilah, and Rossini’s The Barber of Seville, which all sit extremely well on the bassoon. Sophia and I had a great time playing Libby Larsen’s Concert Piece two months before, so we decided to give a repeat performance as the closer for this program. The students at Howard really enjoyed the virtuosity of the piece and you can hear them cheer a minute and 50 seconds into the recording. It was an awesome moment!
Here’s to many more recitals in the future!