Annette Kruisbrink: Toccata

From the album Serhat Bulut Plays Annette Kruisbrink.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HBemh8Gph1Y

There a couple of fun passages using bottleneck technique that you'll know when you hear them.  There are some fun, glittering effects you can get by rapidly and gently tapping a glass or bronze slide over the fingerboard.  You "can" get these kinds of effects on an electric or acoustic instrument but it sounds brighter on classical guitars because of their higher action and more widely spaced strings.  

I was thinking I hadn't linked to any of the music Annette has been writing in a while and wanted to rectify this oversight for the holiday week.  

a new performance of Five Dances for double bass and guitar, a composition by Annette Kruisbrink

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ne-U192hREk

I have the score for this set of pieces and hope, one day, to write about them.  They are works I consider core to contemporary chamber music for classical guitar and bass.  There are a lot of other works written for this pairing of instruments but Five Dances are the pieces I think any and every guitar and bass duet really ought to know.  

If you haven't heard Kruisbrink's album Cirex go check it out.

https://annettekruisbrink.bandcamp.com/album/cirex-guitar-double-bass

Annette Kruisbrink's Dances Nos. 1 & 2 from Five Dances for guitar and doublebass

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VGY75yiEwP0

These are as fun on amplified instruments as they are on unamplified instruments, no surprise. I have the scores for these and think of blogging through them now and then but I'm too backlogged on blogging through music stuff as is for the time being.  Still, I like to share links to Kruisbrink's music from time to time.  Hope you enjoy it. 

Annette Kruisbrink: Five Dances for double bass and guitar (1986)

I've got the scores for these and hope to eventually blog about them in a bit more detail.  But as there's a new film up on Youtube with all five dances played together, I can't resist linking to it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BwdIag88jd0

I know I've been saying this for years but these Five Dances and Cirex should serve as a foundation stone in the repertoire for double bass and guitar. Of course there are other works for this pairing but I keep coming back to this set of dances and Cirex because I just love hearing them. 

Annette Kruisbrink: Etude et fugue (style baroque) for solo guitar, with video score

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JV15-9gFgi0

Here's a lovely etude and fugue by Annette Kruisbrink for solo guitar.  I love how the etude theme transforms from duple to triple meter and shifts across registers throughout the etude.  The fugue is beautifully made and the etude idea returns in a couple of chorale forms to wonderful effect in the coda of the fugue.  So I wanted to share the music this weekend and hope you enjoy it as much as I have.

Annette Kruisbrink--Alamanda for guitar solo and plectrum orchestra

I've linked to performances of Kruisbrink's compositions over the years and still hope one day to discuss her chamber music for double bass and guitar as I think that Cirex and Five Dances should form the foundation of any canon of repertoire (pedagogical or repertoire) for these two instruments.

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=47KxvwPHPMs

https://dobermaneditions.com/product/3449-alamanda?lg=en_US

Annette Kruisbrink--60+ for guitar, a minimalist work for guitar (there's more to minimalist music written for the guitar than Acoustic Counterpoint, after all)

There's more to minimalist music for classical guitar than Reich's Acoustic Counterpoint (aka Electric Counterpoint).  Annette Kruisbrink has written music in a minimalist style for solo guitar and 60+ is an example of her approach to minimalism for solo guitar.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h5gMkXV-lEI

Some of these core ideas also show up in her duet for double bass and guitar called Cirex, which I mean to blog about some day.  For guitarists what jumps out is the scordatura, which you can see when Kruisbrink plays the closing chord.

As some commenters have pointed out, aspects of the piece can be thought of as reminscent of Leo Brouwer's La Espiral Eterna, which is another landmark classical guitar work in a minimalist style.

Although Kruisbrink and Brouwer have both composed in minimalist styles that's not necessarily "the" approach either composer takes across the board.  Kruisbrink's Five Dances for double bass and guitar are more "traditional" and Brouwer's guitar concertos are pretty traditional compared to what I've linked to.

A lot of people will not necessarily enjoy minimalist music and the guitar being the instrument it is, people who are not already open to the possibilities and constraints of minimalist music will not get into 60+.  I admire some minimalist music and could leave chunks of it but Kruisbrink and Brouwer have written works using minimalist techniques that I find effective.

I don't have the score for 60+ but I do have the score for Cirex but before I can eventually get to writing about the chamber piece it seemed good to at least highlight 60+, since musical cels that appear in the solo work appear in the chamber work as I hear both pieces.

Annette Kruisbring: Five dances for guitar and double bass

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8NqRzRsWlSI

Annette Kruisbrink's Five dances for guitar and double bass is another work I've wanted to blog about for years.  It's another work that, alas, I have to probably have on the back burner as over-ambitious blogging about contemporary chamber music including the guitar goes.

and if you want more of a studio recording audio experience  Dez Cordas has that

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZT0JSAZjWNs&list=RDZT0JSAZjWNs&start_radio=1#t=11

Another case where I've got the score for these and would love to blog about the work ... in the future ... but it's yet another case where regulars to this blog have some idea just how backlogged I can tend to get. 

Annette Kruisbrink: Cirex, for double bass and guitar

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WiB7dqb7St8

If I were to recommend a cornerstone for a canon of chamber music for double bass and guitar I would personally insist you have to start with the works of Annette Kruisbrink. 

Cirex is a duet that shares a number of gestures in common with a work called 60+
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h5gMkXV-lEI

That piece is fun and is one of the better examples I can think of of post-minimalist guitar music.

Cirex, however, I feel is sublime.  :) Adding that double bass part takes the ideas to a new and more glorious level!

I'd blog at significantly more length about this because I most certainly have the score and have been wanting to write about this work for years but I have a lot of music I'm trying to write about ... and I'm trying to write about it in the way that I write about it.

So a more detailed score discussion can happen later.  For now, I hope you enjoy Cirex.