American Standard

American Standard, for clarinet and piano, is included on the U.K. label Clarinet Classics release “TIME PIECES: 60 Years of American Music” featuring clarinettist Peter Furniss and pianist David Leiher-Jones.

For more information on the CD TIME PIECES, visit Clarinet Classics. It is available from Amazon and many other online stores. The score and part for American Standard are available for purchase online from Subito Music.

Program Note

Originally written for Furniss and pianist Gareth Hunt in 1993, this single-movement work has an overtly theatrical aspect, harkening back to the composer’s spiritual home in musical theater. A dialogue is established between two contrasting but thematically related sections. The slow, lyrical, aching theme heard at the outset becomes interspersed with a second that is more mischievous, even grotesque in character. Constant development of this faster material provides a means of pushing forward with considerable virtuosity to the composition’s rather resigned conclusion, where both themes (and moods) are finally juxtaposed.

−Richard Dudas