Elliott Carter, Sonata for flute, oboe, cello and harpsichord (1952)

Elliott Carter (1908--2012), Sonata for flute, oboe, cello and harpsichord (1952)
00:00 I. Risoluto
03:19 II. Lento
09:54 III. Allegro
Harvey Sollberger, flute
Charles Kuskin, oboe
Fred Sherry, cello
Paul Jacobs, harpsichord
Artwork by Clyfford Still

[@docsketchy]

Ohmigod, I LOVE this piece!!! I just discovered Carter (after basically ODing on Wuorinen) and this is my favourite one yet. If I could compose, I would want to write music just like this.

[@stueystuey1962]

From my perspective Carter is by far the grand master

[@NealUmphred555]

Somewhere in an unpacked box I have the Nonesuch LP with this music. Thanks for posting it on TH-cam!

[@mysterium364]

Wow... Elliott Carter must be the second longest-living composer I know.

[@UtsyoChakraborty]

Fabulous piece!

[@klangschatten5610]

Stunning.

[@johnappleseed8369]

Awesome!!

[@sanicyouth6540]

It put me in a good mood.

[@galas062]

danke!!

[@deafmix7690]

Preesh!!!

[@FahadBaseer]

I wish the harpsichord was louder

[@goingfortheone1]

+Fahad Baseer So do all harpsichordists.

[@MarcusHK1]

This is especially an issue here as it's used with more modern and louder instruments which usually don't accompany the harpsichord. There would probably be a better balance between a harpsichord and other baroque instruments (I don't mean to say that Carter should't have chosen the harpsichord).

[@MorganHayes_Composer.Pianist]

Even more or an issue in the Double Concerto. Here I’m less troubled.

[@sondrasims-taylor5367]

i sent this to a few god listerners.ok

[@TheNeverposts]

I wanna scream like a schoolgirl
#blessed

[@stueystuey1962]

Masterpiece? Obviously. Among the greatest serial music compositions of all time - gotta be in the discussion. What freaks me out more than anything though is how he got here. It is 1952. The man is 44 years of age. Surely Carter was familiar with the entire ouevre of Webern, thus allowing him to have had time to embrace the minimalism of that great composer. Surely the quartet itself was a well trod path from Hadyn to Schoenberg. But, there is absolutely nothing in the tradition - a tradition going back some 200+ years that gets one to a quartet involving one traditional stringed instrument, a piano like instrument, and two woodwind instruments - both found only in key of C - and here engaged in a serial monstrosity of violently ultra modern gestures. Having written this i think just tipped me off to how he got here. The most eclectic union of traditional instruments, the most traditional of genres, that of the quartet, the absolute eschewal of any extramusical devices, no aleatory, and upon actually listening apart from the obvious lack of tonal center, there is nothing to distract such as spectral techniques, peculiar uses of the instrument and so on. For all that clearly a work of genius as are all EC compositions.

[@TheGloryofMusic]

The piece is not serial. Carter developed his own compositional style, involving the musical voices moving semi-independently of each other.

[@nigelhaywood9753]

I think Debussy had planned to write a sonata for oboe, cello and harpsichord. I don’t remember there being a flute included in the plan. In the baroque era there are sonatas for two solo woodwind instruments, in such a case the cello and harpsichord would have provided the basso continuo.