Canfield: Trio after Brahms for Soprano and Alto Saxophones and Piano

Code: JP4052
ISMN: 979-0-3019-0025-3

The "Trio after Brahms" is another work in Canfield's continuing series of original romantic pieces for instruments for which there was little written during the lifetime of the great romantic composers. His earlier work in this vein, "Concerto after Gliere," achieved within a short time of its premiere wide performance among saxophonists who were looking for such works.

The trio was originally written for violin, alto saxophone and piano for Thomas Liley in 2011. Dr. Liley, a saxophonist and an admirer of Brahms, asked for a work in the style of his favorite composer. While Canfield had and has no delusions about being some sort of reincarnation of the German master, he agreed that he would attempt to write such a work, given that he himself loves Brahms' music, and knows it well. Even though Canfield has not quoted anything from Brahms' own output, there are undoubtedly phrases, chord sequences and other such things that could be found somewhere in the music of this composer. Nor did Canfield worry too much about the places in the piece that Brahms would not have written, especially the rather wild harmonic shifts in the final movement. The composer did not want to completely suppress his own musical voice, and consequently left some of his own 'musical fingerprints'in the work. The work is in the usual four-movement format that Brahms used.

The instrumentation in this edition, substituting soprano saxophone for violin, was made for Steven Stusek. Duration approximately 23 minutes.

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