There is another piece that I absolutely love. It is part of Frank Ticheli’s Concerto for Clarinet and Orchestra. It’s called “Songs for Aaron.” What a phenomenal piece! It starts off with a sustained D and A string bed and then the trumpet and clarinet enter at different times to share the musical floor together. It is one of those goosebumps moments that really captivate the hearts of this music listener and others. The piece is in D major. The horn fifths of the trumpet are very beautifully stark and wide open. It sounds like something of the tuning up of the orchestra before the conductor sets out to conduct the piece but 100 times more beautiful. The clarinet soloist Hacken Rosengren is phenomenal throughout. The anticipation of what will happen next with a piece like this is just awesome. This piece radiates eloquent beauty and expectation like few others. The piece shines in the woodwinds and brass throughout with this open tonality shifting back and forth. This open tonality really shines with this clarinet part. Then, the piano comes in delicately to accompany the clarinet and oboe players. The strings soon join in in a chordal style that beautifies the texture all the more. It sounds as if this piece is an epic journey of a new beginning or an end. The high strings in the middle of the movement are like brightly twinkling stars in a bluish-black sky.
The whole movement is a special experiment in orchestral color that is only surpassed by later Romantic composers while still keeping a modern tinge going. It is a beautiful representation of light orchestra writing—nothing too heavy. It is a lightly satisfying movement to prepare listeners for the next movement. One could almost expect more but it is good enough. The score is very well laid out as is evidenced in the execution of the music itself. It is inspiring me to start composing more abstractly to draw other listeners in.
