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Drexler,David (1967-)
Sex  Male
Comments  David Drexler's music has been performed on three continents by groups such as L.Ensemble Portique, Synchronia, Sound--The Alarm!, The Dutch Tuba Quartet, the May in Miami Festival, and the EmergOrchestra, and has been broadcast on Wisconsin Public Radio and many new-music radio shows around the country. He has received grants and commissions from the Oakwood Chamber Players, Music St. Croix, the Madison Chapter of the Wisconsin Alliance for Composers, the Wisconsin Arts Board, and others. His work "Liberal Media" was recorded by the Oakwood Chamber Players and appears on their CD "Scenes." http://www.drexlermusic.com/
De Profundis
Written  2001
Duration  7:00
Comments  De Profundis was written in remembrance of the victims of September 11, 2001. The opening and closing sections are settings of "Aus tiefer Not," Martin Luther's hymn based on Psalm 130, a prayer of deliverance. The middle section sets two phrases excerpted from Roman chant: "De profundis" from the Offices of the Dead and "Lux aeterna" from the Requiem Mass.
Publisher  Drexler
Inst.  [3] Clarinet in Bb, Piano, Cello
Grade   
Comments   
Devil's Lake
Written  1998
Duration  10:00
Comments  The Standard Atlas and Gazeteer of the World (published in 1890) describes "the weird beauty of Devil's Lake," which lies between three 500-foot bluffs just south of Baraboo, Wisconsin. "Here, in a tremendous gorge...hemmed in on all sides by frowning rocks, of prodigious size, piled up in every conceivable form, nestles one of the loveliest sheets of water in the whole world." The evocative name "Devil's Lake" has stuck even though the original Ho-Chunk name is better translated as "Spirit Lake" or "Sacred Lake." The piece, in one movement divided into three sections, is a slow-motion meditation on the "weird beauty" of the place. The first section gradually piles up large chords in the piano, while the other instruments imitate some of the many bird songs heard around the lake. The second section gets a little more lively (perhaps reflecting some of the human tourist activity) but is interrupted several times by the string instruments chirping like a chorus of frogs. The final section features a slow clarinet melody inspired by the graceful upward spirals of turkey vultures soaring above the water.
Publisher  Drexler
Inst.  [4] Clarinet in Bb, Piano, Violin, Cello
Grade   
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Finding Time
Written  1995
Duration  12:00
Comments  The title of Finding Time refers both to the difficulty of performing the quick tempo changes and to every composer's complaint about the principal obstacle to their work. The piece is in a rough arch form made of several small sections that draw from a variety of musical traditions.
Publisher  Drexler
Inst.  [4] English Horn, Clarinet in Bb/Bass Clarinet, Horn, Double Bass
Grade   
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Forgotten at Dawn...
Written  1994
Duration  10:00
Comments  Forgotten at Dawn... refers to the sensation of waking from a dream unable to remember what the dream was about. The piece is a theme with four variations, or "not-quite-remembered repetitions". Between each variation is a solo for one of the instruments and a rhythmic exploration of harmonies based on the theme. This work was commissioned by the Madison chapter of the Wisconsin Alliance for Composers for the "99-cent Concert Series."
Publisher  Drexler
Inst.  [4] Flute, Clarinet in Bb, Violin, Cello
Grade   
Comments   
Four or Five Studies
Written  1993
Duration  5:00
Comments  Four or Five Studies takes a three note motive and beats it to death in a variety of creative ways. Some of the beatings overlap, so you might count four or five different treatments of the material, depending on how you look at these things. (Actually, you could call it three studies with some transitional material.) Only the motive is beaten upon, no musicians were harmed during the composition of this piece.
Publisher  Drexler
Inst.  [5] Flute, Oboe, Clarinet in Bb, Bassoon, Horn
Grade   
Comments   
Perspectives
Written  1988
Duration  4:00
Comments  Perspectives looks at its material from two different points of view. At the beginning, a canon between the flute and the clarinet is presented against a percussive background of short piano notes and plucked strings. After a solo violin interlude, the canon is repeated (in reverse) with a pedal-point ostinato added to its surroundings. The slow-moving, mechanical canon is also put into perspective by the more active, expressive violin solo.
Publisher  Drexler
Inst.  [5] Flute, Clarinet in Bb, Piano, Violin, Cello
Grade   
Comments   
Snowflakes
Written  1990
Duration  3:00
Comments  Snowflakes is a short piece inspired by the symmetry and the ephemeral nature of Wisconsin's favorite form of precipitation. The patterns in the music aren't always perfectly symmetrical, like a good snowflake should be, but no two are alike, and they all melt before you can get a really good look at them.
Publisher  Drexler
Inst.  [5] Flute, Clarinet in Bb, Piano, Violin, Cello
Grade   
Comments   
Twenty-Four
Written  2002
Duration  8:00
Comments  Twenty-Four is a setting of Kevin Ducey's updated "translation" of the 24th canto of Dante's Inferno.
Publisher  Drexler
Inst.  [5] Flute, Oboe, Clarinet in Bb, Narrator, Cello
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Y2K Bugs
Written  1999
Duration  3:00
Comments  Y2K Bugs is a set of fourteen miniatures that seek to evoke, variously, panicked doom-and-gloom scenarios, mundane nightly news reports, and a timeless sense of wonder at a calendar rollover on a bigger scale than all of us.
Publisher  Drexler
Inst.  [4] Clarinet in Bb, Piano, Violin, Cello
Grade   
Comments   

Prepared on Wed Apr 29 19:11:45 2009