Wednesday, September 25, 2013

Today I present my original composition, DEATH AND REMEMBRANCE.  I completed this piece in 1999 and scored it for piano.  Below is a screenshot of the title page from the autograph score:


DEATH AND REMEMBRANCE is my response to the death of my family dog, Ruggy.  As anyone blessed by the experience of growing up with a dog knows, they are like siblings.  In my case, a sibling who figures into some of my most treasured memories.  I lived my halcyon days away as almost a modern-day Tom Sawyer, roaming the vast square mileage behind my home with that little ragged, homely, darling dog by my side.  What bliss that was!

As the title suggests, the piece is about death, but also life--the carefree life I once knew.  Written for piano, it is rather extensive.  I treated the work as something like a long diary entry.  My pain was great, so I had to keep working on the piece until my grief was spent.

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DEATH AND REMEMBRANCE, Copyright©1999 DamonMusic by Sean Damon Rohde. All rights reserved

Monday, September 16, 2013

Today I present my original composition, FOR ANNE.  I completed this little piece in 1993 and scored it for flute.  Below is a screenshot of the complete autograph score:


This trifle is something I wrote for Anne, head librarian of the Mill Valley Public Library, a beautiful building nestled in the redwoods of Mill Valley, California where I worked for many years.

Anne was beginning study of the flute, which prompted my idea of writing a little piece for her to practice.  Fittingly, it is brief and consists of some of the various techniques intrinsic to the instrument, such as, staccato, legato, a bit of ornamentation, a little syncopation, some scale work, and a basic ABA form.

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FOR ANNE, Copyright©1993 DamonMusic by Sean Damon Rohde. All rights reserved

Tuesday, September 3, 2013

Today I present my original composition, TALE OF A SONGBIRD.  I completed this piece in 2007 and scored it for violin and piano.  Below is a screenshot of the title page from the autograph score:


For a short while, my sister lived down the street from me. Her unit was right on the water facing the west. I used to go over to her place, take in the view, and try to make art of it. While there, I composed this piece in recognition of the numerous birds that would dart to and fro past the great picture window. Their ecstatic animation drove my pen in this one of many works I have written in a pastoral vein.

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TALE OF A SONGBIRD, Copyright©2007 DamonMusic by Sean Damon Rohde. All rights reserved