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The audio files below are incompletely rendered by computer software but do provide basic representations of the pieces, in spite of the missing dynamics, tempo changes, and parts.
A free parts download of music on this page may be requested by email to Renee Leech.
1. String Quartet No. 1 in 5/4
Movement I (2:38 minutes):
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Movement II (2:16 minutes): ,
Movement III (2:57 minutes):
This Quartet was read in 1981 at the Conference on Contemporary String Quartets by Women Composers held at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, San Francisco, California. The main challenge of this piece is the 5/4 meter, which gives a spontaneous drive to the piece. The first and second movements are straightforward, and the last has a more challenging interweaving of parts.
Violinist’s comment on Movement I: The piece has a lot of strength and genuine movement and after performing it I was close to tears…. Beth C., Cabrillo College Chamber Music class, September, 1981
The composer will be interested in hearing from musicians who have read through this piece.
2. The Tulip – Piano Quintet with Soprano
The Tulip (4:26 minutes):
This piece has not been played in performance or workshop.
The lyrics, with serendipity and angst, consider the significance of a tulip in a weedy garden. The piece employs tonal dissonance and may be tonally challenging.
Improvisation opportunities in The Tulip:
Vocalist: There may be an opportunity for the advanced singer to practice the art of improvisation to vary repetitious motives. The parts are not equal as in true chamber music. The quartet’s function is mainly to add dramatic depth to the understated comedy of the singing.
Instrumentalists: An entire optional section has been added for structured instrumental improvisation. This is done over a tonal skeleton, for basically the length of a “verse.” There is enough structure that even the most basic sustaining of one or more of the tones prescribed could give an interesting effect. Visualization: Placid meadow or weedy garden with life teeming out of the line of sight.
The improvisation was added when the composer (myself) realized that the cello part was a repetitious pattern, not really in the spirit of chamber music. The repetitiousness was felt necessary to ground the challenging harmonic structure. To ameliorate and apologize for this sort of monotony, a one-verse-length cello-soprano duet was inserted, followed by an optional one-verse-length multi-instrumental improvisation in which the soprano could join in, ad libidum, without written lyrics.
The composer will be interested in comments or questions of musicians who have read through this piece.