Chiavi in Mano is a piano concerto in one movement by the composer Yehudi Wyner. The work was commissioned by the Boston Symphony Orchestra and was first performed in February 2005 by the pianist Robert D. Levin and the Boston Symphony Orchestra under the conductor Robert Spano. The piece was later awarded Pulitzer Prize for Music in 2006. [1] [2]
Chiavi in Mano has a duration of roughly 20 minutes and is composed in a single continuous movement. Wyner described the composition of the piece in the score program notes, writing:
Much of the concerto was composed during the summer of 2004 at the American Academy in Rome in a secluded studio hidden within the Academy walls. While much of the composing took place far from home, the concerto comes out as a particularly "American" piece, shot through with vernacular elements. As in many of my compositions, simple, familiar musical ideas are the starting point. A shape, a melodic fragment, a rhythm, a chord, a texture, or a sonority may ignite the appetite for exploration. How such simple insignificant things can be altered, elaborated, extended, and combined becomes the exciting challenge of composition. I also want the finished work to breathe in a natural way, to progress spontaneously, organically, moving toward a transformation of the musical substance in ways unimaginable to me when I began the journey. Transformation is the goal, with the intention of achieving an altered state of perception and exposure that I am otherwise unable to achieve. [3]
The work is scored for an orchestra comprising two flutes, piccolo, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, four horns, two trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion, and strings. [3]
John Coolidge Adams is an American composer and conductor of classical music and opera, with strong roots in minimalism.
Samuel Osmond Barber II was an American composer of orchestral, opera, choral, and piano music. He is one of the most celebrated composers of the 20th century; music critic Donal Henahan stated, "Probably no other American composer has ever enjoyed such early, such persistent and such long-lasting acclaim."
The Pulitzer Prize for Music is one of seven Pulitzer Prizes awarded annually in Letters, Drama, and Music. It was first given in 1943. Joseph Pulitzer arranged for a music scholarship to be awarded each year, and this was eventually converted into a prize: "For a distinguished musical composition of significant dimension by an American that has had its first performance in the United States during the year."
Ellen Taaffe Zwilich is an American composer, the first female composer to win the Pulitzer Prize for Music. Her early works are marked by atonal exploration, but by the late 1980s, she had shifted to a postmodernist, neoromantic style. She has been called "one of America's most frequently played and genuinely popular living composers." She was a 1994 inductee into the Florida Artists Hall of Fame. Zwilich has served as the Francis Eppes Distinguished Professor at Florida State University.
Shulamit Ran is an Israeli-American composer. She moved from Israel to New York City at 14, as a scholarship student at the Mannes College of Music. Her Symphony (1990) won her the Pulitzer Prize for Music. In this regard, she was the second woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for Music, the first being Ellen Taaffe Zwilich in 1983. Ran was a professor of music composition at the University of Chicago from 1973 to 2015. She has performed as a pianist in Israel, Europe and the U.S., and her compositional works have been performed worldwide by a wide array of orchestras and chamber groups.
John Paul Corigliano is an American composer of classical music. His scores, now numbering over one hundred, have won him the Pulitzer Prize, five Grammy Awards, Grawemeyer Award for Music Composition, and an Oscar. He is a distinguished professor of music at Lehman College and the Graduate Center of the City University of New York and on the composition faculty at the Juilliard School.
Elliott Cook Carter Jr. was an American modernist composer. One of the most respected composers of the second half of the 20th century, he combined elements of European modernism and American "ultra-modernism" into a distinctive style with a personal harmonic and rhythmic language, after an early neoclassical phase. His compositions are known and performed throughout the world, and include orchestral, chamber music, solo instrumental, and vocal works. Carter was twice awarded the Pulitzer Prize.
Walter Hamor Piston Jr,, was an American composer of classical music, music theorist, and professor of music at Harvard University.
Aaron Jay Kernis is a Pulitzer Prize- and Grammy Award-winning American composer serving as a member of the Yale School of Music faculty. Kernis spent 15 years as the music advisor to the Minnesota Orchestra and as Director of the Minnesota Orchestra's Composers' Institute, and is currently the Workshop Director of the Nashville Symphony Composer Lab. He has received numerous awards and honors throughout his thirty-five year career. He lives in New York City with his wife, pianist Evelyne Luest, and their two children.
The Piano Concerto, Op. 38, by Samuel Barber was commissioned by the music publishing company G. Schirmer Inc. in honor of the centenary of their founding. The premiere was on September 24, 1962, in the opening festivities of Philharmonic Hall, now David Geffen Hall, the first hall built at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in Manhattan, with John Browning as soloist with the Boston Symphony Orchestra conducted by Erich Leinsdorf.
Steven Edward Stucky was a Pulitzer Prize-winning American composer.
Jennifer Elaine Higdon is an American composer of classical music. She has received many awards, including the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Music for her Violin Concerto and three Grammy Awards for Best Contemporary Classical Composition, in 2010, 2018, and 2020. She was elected a Member of the American Philosophical Society in 2019. She has been a professor of composition at the Curtis Institute of Music since 1994.
Joseph Clyde Schwantner is a Pulitzer Prize-winning American composer, educator and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters since 2002. He was awarded the 1970 Charles Ives Prize.
Christopher Chapman Rouse III was an American composer. Though he wrote for various ensembles, Rouse is primarily known for his orchestral compositions, including a Requiem, a dozen concertos, and six symphonies. His work received numerous accolades, including the Kennedy Center Friedheim Award, the Grammy Award for Best Classical Contemporary Composition, and the Pulitzer Prize for Music. He also served as the composer-in-residence for the New York Philharmonic from 2012 to 2015.
Yehudi Wyner is an American composer, pianist, conductor and music educator.
The Second Concerto for Orchestra is a concerto for orchestra by the American composer Steven Stucky. The work was commissioned by the Los Angeles Philharmonic while Stucky was their composer-in-residence for the inaugural season of the Walt Disney Concert Hall. It was completed in 2003 and was first performed on March 12, 2004, with the conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen leading the Los Angeles Philharmonic. The piece was awarded the 2005 Pulitzer Prize for Music.
Concerto Fantastique is an orchestral composition in four movements by the American composer Ralph Shapey. The work was commissioned by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, who first performed the work under the composer on November 21, 1991. It was a finalist for the 1992 Pulitzer Prize for Music.
The Violin Concerto is a composition for solo violin and orchestra by the American composer Joan Tower. It was commissioned by the Barlow Endowment for Music Composition and the Snowbird Institute. The piece was first performed by the violinist Elmar Oliveira and the Utah Symphony under the conductor Joseph Silverstein on April 24, 1992, in Salt Lake City, Utah. It is dedicated to the violinist Elmar Oliveira. The composition was a finalist for the 1993 Pulitzer Prize for Music.
The Piano Concerto No. 3 is a composition for solo piano and orchestra by the American composer Peter Lieberson. The work was commissioned by the Minnesota Orchestra for the ensemble's centennial. It was given its world premiere by the pianist Peter Serkin and the Minnesota Orchestra in Minneapolis on November 26, 2003. The piece is dedicated to Peter Serkin and was a finalist for the 2004 Pulitzer Prize for Music.
The Piano Concerto No. 1 is a composition for solo piano and orchestra by the American composer Peter Lieberson. The work was commissioned by the Boston Symphony Orchestra for its centennial. Lieberson started composing the piece in 1980 and completed it on March 2, 1983. It was written for the pianist Peter Serkin, who first performed the concerto with the Boston Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Seiji Ozawa on April 21, 1983. The piece is dedicated to Peter Serkin and Seiji Ozawa. It was a finalist for the 1984 Pulitzer Prize for Music.
![]() | This article about a concerto is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |