ddc

The performance of Sonatina for Flute and Harpsichord is from a recital of my music given at the State University of New York, College at Brockport, on 13 april 1975. I taught there for seventeen years until they eliminated the music department for budgetary reasons. Jan Angus plays the flute and Jerry Lee the harpsichord.

I composed this work in 1959 when I was a graduate student at the University of Illinois, studying with Gordon W. Binkerd. At this time I first became acquainted with the harpsichord, one by Hubbard (or, perhaps by Dowd, or else the two of them when they worked together) which was in the studio of George Hunter, with whom I studied performance practices of early music.

The work is in three movements, in the typical fast-slow-fast order. The first is written in a free version of sonata-allegro form. The second is a singing cantalena (ABA) in which the middle section uses only the 4' rank of the harpsichord (it sounds an octave higher than the other 8' strings and is usually used only added to them for color and brightness). The final movement is again fast and very rhythmic except for one singing section. Throughout the work, and especially in the fast movements, rather "jazzy" cross rhythms appear frequently.
I give the option of performing this with piano. I've heard it with harpsichord and with piano. I prefer the harpsichord, although the greater freedom allowed by the piano provides an interesting contrast.