Pan Penseroso

Description

Flute, Piano — Pan Penseroso (2009) is a concerto for solo flute or two flutes and orchestra in three movements:1. The Noise of Folly2. Prophetic Strain3. More is Meant (than meets the ear)Pan Penseroso and the titles of its three movements are taken from John Milton’s great poemIl Penseroso (The Contemplative Man). The music aligns itself with this response to the poet’searlier L’Allegro (the Cheerful Man). In my concerto the flutist Pan, like the mature Milton, casts areflective musical eye on the world, renouncing all “vain deluding joyes,” so as to better hear the“Sweet Bird that shunn’st the noise of folly…”Written for the master flutist Robert Dick, Pan Penseroso includes a number of procedures exploredin his pioneering book The Other Flute: A Performance Manual of Contemporary Techniques.