Clyde Mitchell - Nickel:Concerto For Piccolo / Concerto For Four Wagner Tubas - Import CD

Credits:

Clyde Mitchell

Description:

Christopher Tyler Nickel's New! Concerto for 4 Wagnerian Tubas! Christopher Tyler Nickel (1978-) is a Canadian composer who specializes in music for the concert hall as well as for film, television and theater. His representative works include various works for oboe & oboe d'amore (unaccompanied, sonatas, chamber music, concertos), Symphony No. 2 conducted by Clyde Mitchell, "Fanfare for Freedom" performed by the Northeastern Pennsylvania Philharmonic to an audience of 40,000, and for theater musical based on Jules Verne's "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea," ballet music for the CatchingART Contemporary Ballet, and music for Vancouver's Shakespeare Festival "Bard on the Beach," among others, and the Avie label in the U.K. His works include a collection of oboe concertos (AV2433), Symphony No. 2 (AV2456), and Sonatas & Chamber Works for Oboe (AV2558), all released on the Avie label in the U.K.His honors include four SOCAN (Society of Canadian Composers, Authors and Music Publishers) Awards, a Gold Award at the Park City Film Music Festival 2004, two Leo Awards (an award for the film and television industry in British Columbia, Canada) (14 nominations), and a Western Canadian Music Award nomination. Tyler Nickel has composed at least a dozen concertos over the past two decades, but what is remarkable about his work is his preoccupation with letting instruments that are seldom in the limelight shine. This album also features two works for unusual instruments: the Piccolo Concerto, featuring the Los Angeles Philharmonic's piccolo player Sarah Jackson, and the Concerto for Four Wagnerian Tubas. The Piccolo Concerto was commissioned by Sarah Jackson and conductor Clyde Mitchell, along with the Vancouver-based Lions Gate Sinfonia, for which Nickel is composer-in-residence. The work is highly chromatic, driving, anxious, even desperate, and in the first few phrases, Nickel presents nearly all of the motives and melodies of the three movements.In the dance-like finale, the dizzying melody of the solo parts and the angular orchestral lines create a dark cinematic atmosphere that reflects Nickel's extensive experience as a film composer. In contrast, the Concerto for Four Wagnerian Tubas is harmonic, luminous, and richly resonant. Nickel explains that the Wagner tuba instrument was conceived by Wagner as an instrument that would fill the gap between horns, trombones, and tubas, which he incorporated into his orchestration of "The Ring of the Nibelung" in search of a new timbre. Tyler Nickel does an excellent job of bringing out the instrument's warmth in the lower registers, which is warmer than the horn and enhances the harmony of the brass chorus. Tokyo M-Plus