Sonata No. 5 for Solo Violin

DEDICATORY NOTE FOR SONATA NO. 5 FOR SOLO VIOLIN IN CELEBRATION OF ROBERT MORRIS’S 70TH BIRTHDAY ANDREW MEAD MET ROBERT MORRIS IN THE FALL of 1973, when I was visiting my sister in New Haven. I was an undergraduate at the time at a small midwestern conservatory, and was finding the fit not good for me. I had been leaning towards applying to transfer to Yale, and my encounter with Morris was all the push I needed. While I was not able to study composition with him directly, I did take his graduate course in twelve-tone music, and had the thrill of hearing the premieres of such pieces as In Different Voices and Not Lilacs. I went on to graduate school elsewhere, and Bob moved on from New Haven, first to Pittsburgh, and then to Eastman. We encountered each other again at a meeting of the Society for Music Theory in New Haven in the early 80s, and started, perhaps continued, a conversation that has been going on ever since. I have had the great joy of I 298 Perspectives of New Music witnessing his massive accumulation of remarkable scores, and have had the pleasure of listening to a wealth of his music, although there are still pieces I am longing to hear. I have made the trip from Ann Arbor to Rochester to hear some of his premieres, and I was able to be present for both Playing Outside and Sound/Path/Field, two of his compositions to be heard out of doors. Bob’s music has been part of my sound world for most of my musical life, and his ways of thinking about music have had a salutary effect on my own. The first piece I wrote as an undergraduate at Yale was a sonata for solo violin, and it is the first piece I wrote that I would still show anyone. I have returned to the solo violin on various occasions, finding it a place to work through technical and aesthetic questions that is both intimate and effusive. When Milton Babbitt passed away, it was a part of another solo violin sonata that served as my place to remember him. Now that Bob is turning 70, I have turned again to the instrument to celebrate a long and rewarding friendship. I don’t know if Bob will hear himself in the piece, or if he will be able to untangle the ways the ideas I learned from him are woven in with my particular compositional habits, but I know that I wouldn’t be writing the music I am today had we not crossed paths more than 40 years ago. And, for his amusement, I have again slipped in a little quotation from one of my favorite composers, as I did in the first sonata. But I will leave both composer and quotation nameless, lest I spoil the fun. —May 2, 2014 f f Maestoso q = 36 poco f ben f poco f 5 ben f mf mf 8 poco f f mf mf 12 f mp 16 mf p poco f 19 p f mp 21 f mp ben f poco f 23 3 4     5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 5 3 5 5 Sonata no. 5 for Solo Violin For Robert Morris, on the occasion of his 70th birthday Andrew Mead I    5 5 5 3 5 3 5 5 5 5 5    5     5 5 3 5 5 5                     6       6 6 3 6 6 6 6 6        3 6 6 6      3 6 6 3                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     300 Perspectives of New Music mf f mp 25 ben f p 27 p pp 29 mf p f p pp 31 f mf fp 33 ben f 35 mf p pp ppp pp 36 ppp pp 39     6 6            6 6 6 5 5 5  5 5 5 7 7 7   3   3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 5 5 5   3 7 7 3 3 3 5 5 7       3      7 3 3 3 3 3 3 3    3   5 5 3 3 3   5 5 5 5 5 5                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                2 Sonata No. 5...