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| Play sample First movement (191K) | Play sample Third movement (297K) |
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| Play sample First movement (191K) | Play sample Third movement (297K) |
The second movement from the Flute Concerto has been re-arranged for concert performance, for flute and piano, and published in the volume 'Little Soundings:A selection of Flute Music by NZ Composers'
Opus No : 56b
Category : Flute / Piano
Year : 1998
Duration : 6'30"
Commissioned by : Dunedin Sinfonia
Instrumentation: flute and piano
Level :
3 - for professional and semi-professional musicians
Available from
the composer
Alexa Still and New Zealand Symphony Orchestra,
Kiwi Flute Koch 3-7345-2 H1
The Flute Concerto was composed for flutist Alexa Still (Principal flute, NZSO) in 1993 while Ritchie was Composer - in - Residence with The Dunedin Sinfonia. Unlike the Symphony "Boum", written in the same year, this concerto is a generally happy and open-sounding work, and reflects aspects of Alexa Still's personality as well as her playing. She first performed the concerto on September 4th, 1993 in The Glenroy Auditorium, and subsequently recorded it with The New Zealand Symphony Orchestra.
The slow second movement is lyrical and improvisational in style, with two cadenzas at the start of the movement. The first of these was scored for bass clarinet, but becomes a flute solo in the version for piano and flute. In between these cadenzas a warm and gentle theme appears. However, it soon fades into anxious repeated chords on the piano while the flute plays nervous, flickering gestures. As the tension dissolves the piano introduces a laconic theme, interpersed with little cadenzas on the flute. The music builds to a climax where the warm, gentle theme returns in a contrapuntal version, and again fades into the anxious piano chords. A brief and mysterious coda contains references back to the opening cadenza, and the piece ends unresolved.