Availability

Playing score 0-571-51481-2 on sale

Programme Notes

This short piece, a little over three minutes long, was written in response to Nicholas Daniel’s request for something to commemorate this teacher Janet Craxton, whom I had known since childhood and for whom I wrote my Oboe Cantata. Just as I was wondering how to begin I heard that Andrzej Panufnik, whose music and personality I admired a lot, had died. I began to sketch a melody for Cor Anglais, which quickly sprouted a canonic part for clarinet (Joy Farrall – Mrs. Daniel). Some months later, this in turn sprouted the final movement of my octet Songs Without Voices – which so transformed the character of the original that I decided to let the duo stand intact as a separate piece.

© Oliver Knussen

Elegiac Arabesques

Ardingly College (Ardingly, West Sussex, United Kingdom)

Haffner Wind Ensemble

Elegiac Arabesques

Radio 3 Lunchtime Concert

BBC Radio 3 (United Kingdom)

Nicholas Daniel/Chen Halevi

Elegiac Arabesques

New Walk Museum and Art Gallery (Leicester, United Kingdom)

Nicholas Daniel/Chen Halevi

Elegiac Arabesques

CM Interlude 3 World Premieres of Syrinx

Britten Studio (Snape, Suffolk, United Kingdom)

Birmingham Contemporary Music Group

Elegiac Arabesques

No Venue (Dartington, Devon, United Kingdom)

Nicholas Daniel/Duncan Prescott