Program note for Duo for violin and piano

The Duo for Violin and Piano (2005) was commissioned by the McKim Fund in the Library of Congress and is dedicated to the violinist Rolf Schulte, who premiered the work with pianist James Winn. The Duo has two movements and lasts about 19 minutes.

 This work delineates two responses, rage and grief, to the sudden deaths of two close friends and a student. The first movement, entitled “Disputation,” begins with quiet introductory piano chords but quickly becomes fast and aggressive. Its form employs a spiral technique in which an idea expands and becomes more complex with each cycle. Here the process reverses about three-fifths of the way through, collapsing the music back to its starting point while the material continues to proliferate. The longer, more contemplative second movement, “Elegy,” is in binary form: ABC/A’B’C’. This movement has a lyrical, passionate, and at times dirge-like character; it searches for consolation.

Fred Lerdahl