Dahl+Sinfonietta

purchase from: @http://www.shattingermusic.com/Departments/Wind_Band/WBMain.aspx
 * Ingolf Dahl** (June 9, 1912 – August 6, 1970) was a German-born American composer, pianist, conductor, and educator.

Article by Byron Adams. Analyzing Sinfonietta.



Article by Kloecker, Analyzing Sinonietta.

overview from Oxford online:

Dahl, Ingolf
( b Hamburg, 9 June 1912 ; d Frutigen, nr Berne , 6 Aug 1970 ). American composer, conductor and pianist of Swedish-German parentage. He began his formal musical education at the Cologne Hochschule für Musik, then fled the Nazi regime to continue his studies in Switzerland at the Zürich Conservatory and the University of Zürich. Later he studied composition with Boulanger in California. Dahl ’s professional career began with coaching and conducting at the Zürich Stadttheater. In 1938 he left Europe for the USA and settled in Los Angeles. From then on the range of his musical activities and involvements was immense, including work for radio and film studios, composing, conducting, giving piano recitals and lecturing. He joined the faculty of the University of Southern California in 1945 and taught there until his death. Among his better-known former students is the conductor Michael Tilson Thomas. In addition to teaching composition, conducting and music history, Dahl directed the university’s symphony orchestra (1945–58, 1968–9), performing much contemporary music. He introduced to the West Coast important new works by Americans (including Copland, Diamond, Foss, Ives, Piston and Ruggles) and by Europeans (Berg’s Chamber Concerto, Schoenberg’s //Pierrot lunaire//, Hindemith’s //Marienleben// and Stravinsky’s //The Wedding// and //Perséphone//), and promoted performances of early music. He also planned and conducted the famous Concerts on the Roof and the Monday Evening Concerts in Los Angeles. His close collaboration with Stravinsky resulted in numerous lectures and performances, some arrangements of his music, and his translation, with Arnold Knodel, of Stravinsky’s //Poetics of Music// (Cambridge, MA, 1947). Dahl organized the Tanglewood Study Group at the Berkshire Music Center in 1952 and directed it for five years. He gave concerts in Europe (1961–2) sponsored by the US State Department, and directed and conducted at the Ojai Festival (1964–6). Among his awards are two Guggenheim Fellowships (1954 and 1958), a grant from the National Institute of Arts and Letters (1954), and the 1964 Alice M. Ditson Award. A series of annual Ingolf Dahl lectures on the history and theory of music was initiated at the University of Southern California in 1981. Although Dahl wrote music from an early age, his output was fairly small; his varied career provided little time for composing, and he wrote slowly and meticulously. Though his work reflected the changes in his musical environment, the individuality of his style remained strong. His early works exhibit the dissonant and densely polyphonic texture typical of German Expressionism in the 1920s. The impact of the USA and, later, his collaboration with Stravinsky resulted in increasing clarification of texture, a trend towards diatonicism and a pronounced interest in timbre and instrumental virtuosity. Dahl used serial techniques in his music beginning with the Piano Quartet (1957), and evolved large, imaginatively conceived structures held together by motivic and tonal interrelationships and complex but compelling harmonic forces. This development led to his remarkable Sinfonietta for concert band (1961) with its unabashed leanings towards Stravinsky, then reached another peak in his formidable, almost neo-romantic //Aria sinfonica// of 1965. Thereafter Dahl ’s works exhibit increasing concentration: leaner instrumentation, compact forms and a stern focus on essentials.

Editions
with J. Szigeti : //C.E. Ives: Violin Sonata no.3// (Bryn Mawr, 1951 ) //J.S. Bach: Violin Concerto in d, bwv1052a// (New York, 1959 )

Works
(selective list) Principal publishers: Associated, Boosey & Hawkes, A. Broude, European American, Presser
 * Orch: Conc., a sax, wind, 1949, rev. 1953; Sym. concertante, 2 cl, orch, 1952; The Tower of St Barbara, sym. legend, 1954; Sinfonietta, concert band, 1961 ; Aria sinfonica, 1965; Quodlibet on American Folktunes (The Fancy Blue Devil’s Breakdown), 1965 [arr. of pf work]; Variations on a Theme by C.P.E. Bach, str, 1967; 4 Intervals, str, 1967, arr. pf 4 hands, 1967; Elegy Conc., vn, chbr orch, 1970, completed D. Michalsky, 1971 ||
 * Chbr and solo inst: Allegro and Arioso, ww qt, 1942; Music for Brass Insts (Brass Qnt), 1944; Variations on a Swedish Folktune, fl, 1945, rev. 1962, arr. fl, a fl, 1970; Conc. a tre, cl, vn, vc, 1946; Duo, vc, pf, 1946, rev. 1948; Notturno, vc, pf, 1946; Divertimento, va, pf, 1948; Couperin Variations, rec/fl, hpd/pf, 1957; Pf Qt, 1957; Serenade, 4 fl, 1960; Pf Trio, 1962; Duettino concertante, fl, perc, 1966; IMC Fanfare, 3 tpt, 3 trbn, 1968; Fanfare on A and C, 3 tpt, hn, baritone, trbn, 1969 [for Aaron Copland]; Sonata da camera, cl, pf, 1970; 5 Duets, 2 cl, 1970; Little Canonic Suite, vn, va, 1970; Variations on a French Folksong, fl, pf, 1973 ||
 * Pf: Rondo, 4 hands, 1938; Prelude and Fugue, 1939; Pastorale montano, 1943; Hymn and Toccata, 1947; Quodlibet on American Folktunes (The Fancy Blue Devil’s Breakdown), 2 pf 8 hands, 1953; Sonata seria, 1953; Sonatina alla marcia, 1956; Fanfares, 1958; Sonata pastorale, 1959; Reflections, 1967 ||
 * Vocal: 3 Songs (A. Ehrismann), S, pf, 1933; A Cycle of Sonnets (Petrarch), Bar, pf, 1968; A Noiseless, Patient Spider (W. Whitman), female chorus, pf, 1970 ||
 * Arrs.: I. Stravinsky: Danses concertantes, 2 pf, 1944; Scènes de ballet, pf, 1944; Petite suite, 2 pf 4 hands, 1944 ||

// Kurt Stone and Gary L. Maas. " Dahl, Ingolf ." Grove Music Online. Oxford Music Online. 20 Mar. 2012 < http://0-www.oxfordmusiconline.com.patris.apu.edu/subscriber/article/grove/music/07054 > //

//Sinfonietta for Concert Band// (1961) general information: @http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ingolf_Dahl
 * Duration: about 17 min. ||
 * ~ Description: || score (134 p.) 31cm. ||
 * ~ 3 movements: || 1. Introduction and rondo.- 2 -Notturno pastorale. 3.-Dance variations ||

Oxford Music Online definition of Sinfonietta:

(Fr.: //symphoniette//).
__**A small-scale symphony, in terms either of length or of the size of the orchestra needed to perform it.**__ The first known work to be so designated was Rimsky-Korsakov's //Symphoniette sur des thèmes russes//, composed //c.// 1880 and published in 1887. Since the early 20th century the Italian form ‘ sinfonietta ’ has been preferred (the word is not genuinely Italian, however). Among composers who have written sinfoniettas are Reger ( 1905 ), Prokofiev ( 1909 ), Janáček ( 1926 ), Britten ( 1932 ), Poulenc ( 1947 ), and Hindemith ( 1949 ). Janáček's Sinfonietta is unusual in that it requires a large orchestra, but the movements are shorter than those of the average symphony and the work could be described as an orchestral suite. Latterly the term has been used for small orchestras or chamber ensembles, for example the London Sinfonietta. —/ Lalage Cochrane

http://windrep.org has some basic info on Dahl... needs updating!

audio purchase and samples: @http://www.cduniverse.com/search/xx/music/pid/1955091/a/DePaul+University+Wind+Ensemble.htm

@http://mp3skull.com/mp3/sinfonietta_dahl.html media type="custom" key="13398124" media type="custom" key="13398132"

youtube links: media type="custom" key="13397532" @http://youtu.be/Hyk8Z-tTmgg mvt. 2 pastorale nocturne from Sinfonietta by Ingolf Dahl Performed by the Metropolitan Wind Symphony May 17, 2009 Live in Lexington, MA

Teaching music through performance in band vol. 1 has info on Dahl Sinfonietta: make sure to buy the revised second edition of volume 1 @http://www.amazon.com/Teaching-Music-Through-Performance-Band/dp/0941050939/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1203620379&sr=1-1 see on line to listen to excerpt and see the publishers notes for teaching music through performance in band: @http://www.teachingmusic.org/bandvol1.cfm

@http://www.cbdna.org/cgi-bin/about9.pl Notes from the College Band Directors Association:
 * Sinfonietta for Concert Band** - Ingolf Dahl, 1961

Sinfonietta for Concert Band was commissioned jointly by the Western and Northwestern Divisions of CBDNA. It was premiered in January of 1961 in Los Angeles, California by the University of Southern California Band conducted by the composer. The project was lead by co-chairs William Schaefer and Robert Vagner.

In discussing the initial idea of the Sinfonietta, Dahl related the following information:

"First of all, I wanted it to be a piece that was full of size, a long piece, a substantial piece--a piece that, without apologies for its medium, would take its place alonside symphonic works of any other kind. But in addition, I hoped to make it a "light" piece. Something in the Serenade style, serenade "tone," and perhaps even form."

"Arthur Honneger once was commissioned to write an oratorio (King David) for chorus and an ill-assorted group of wind instruments. He asked Stravinsky, "What should I do? I have never before heard of this odd combination of winds." Stravinsky replied, "That is very simple. You must approach this task as if it had always been your greatest wish to write for these instruments, and as if a work for just such a group were the same one that you had wanted to write all of your life." This is good advice and I tried to follow it. Only in my case it was not only before but after the work was done and the Sinfonietta was finished that it turned out to be indeed the piece that I had wanted to write all my life."

What emerged in the Sinfonietta is a composition which has been called one of the most important symphonic works of the twentieth century, regardless of the medium. In the introductory note for the Sinfonietta, Ingolf Dahl writes:

"The form of this Sinfonietta is akin to an arch or to the span of a large bridge: the sections of the first movement correspond, in reverse order and even in some details, to the section of the last. For example, the opening fanfares of the back-stage trumpets are balanced by those at the close of the work; the thematic material that ends th first movement is itself shaped like an arch: it begins with an unaccompanied line in the clarinets and ends with a corresponding solo in the alto clarinet. The center of the middle movement, which is the center of the whole work--a gavotte-like section, and the lightest music of the entire Sinfonietta--is the "keystone of the arch"

The tonal idiom of the work grows out of the acoustical properties of the symphonic band: a wealth of overtones. This I feel that bands call for music with more open and consonant intervals than would a string ensemble or a piano. The Sinfonietta is tonal, and centered around A-flat major. At the same time, however, its corner movements are based on a series of six tones (A-flat, E-flat, C, G, D, A) which, through various manipulations, provide most of the work's harmonic and melodic ingredients and patterns. The six tones were chosen to permit all kinds of triadic formations. Furthermore, their inversion at th interval of the major sixth yields a second six-tone set which comprises the remaining six tones of a complete twelve-tone row."

Dahl made slight revisions to the score in 1964, and the final version was performed at the 13th National Conference of the CBDNA in Tempe, Arizona, on December 18th of that year, with the composer conducting.


 * Availability:** Purchase-Tetra Music



resources:

Ingolf Dahl's "Sinfonietta" for Concert Band-An Interpretive Analysis
[|Adams, Byron]. [|The Instrumentalist][|43. 3] (Oct 1988): 21.

An Analysis of Ingolf Dahl's "Sinfonietta for Concert Band"
[|Kloecker, John]. [|Journal of Band Research][|28. 2] (Spring 1993): 37-91.



[|A SURVEY AND HANDBOOK OF ANALYSIS FOR THE CONDUCTING AND INTERPRETATION OF SEVEN SELECTED WORKS IN THE STANDARD REPERTOIRE FOR WIND BAND] Diss.Bruning, Earl. Ball State University, 1980. 1980. 8120740. Sinfonietta, by Ingolf Dahl ; Symphony No. 3, by Vittorio Giannini; Lincolnshire Posy, by Percy Grainger; Symphony in B-flat, by Paul Hindemith; Symphony for Band, by Vincent Persichetti; La Fiesta Mexicana, by H. Owen Reed; and Theme and Variations, Opus 43a, by Arnold Schoenberg. Conductor problems and solutions were located by measure number or rehearsal letter for organization into a quick reference to specific challenges.

@http://www.umwindorchestra.com/2010/06/dahl-saxophone-concerto.html (Link to University of Maryland page with notes on Dahl Alto saxophone concerto)

Further questions regarding availability score, parts and recordings may be directed to: Jim Cochran - Shattinger Music