Elizabeth R. Austin
Elizabeth R. Austin
Goucher College(BA), Fontainebleau Conservatoire Americaine (1958:Boulanger), Hartt School (M.M.), University of Connecticut (Ph.D.); Publishers: Arsis Press, Peter Tonger Verlag; Recordings: Capstone; recent grants: Connecticut Commission on the Arts; recent awards: Nashville Music Awards nominee; ties to Mannheim (Germany) Musikhochschule, Brandenburg (Germany) Colloquium for New Music. A complete list of works is available from the composer, as well as from Dr. Michael K. Slayton (Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN), whose doctoral dissertation (2000) was based on Austin's music. Scores are available either from the publishers (Arsis Press, Peter Tonger Verlag), from the American Composers Alliance, or from the composer. Recordings are available either from Capstone Records or from the composer.
ROSE SONATA
Year: 2002
Duration (in minutes): 15'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: piano
Instruments: piano
Description: Commissioned by Jane Meredith Roche, with support from The Rockefeller Foundation. In the 'form' of a rose, this exploration of the rose' essence includes poetic texts by Bachmann, Goethe, Kleist, Rilke, Williams.
American Triptych
Year: 2001
Duration (in minutes): 7'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: piano
Instruments: piano
Publisher: American Composers Alliance
Description: With support from The Rockefeller Foundation. A rag, blues, and hoedown!
Wie Eine Blume"....orch-ideas and roses...
Year: 2001
Duration (in minutes): 17'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: larger chamber ensembles - more than 4 players, mixed instrument ensemble
Instruments: any woodwind, percussion
Like The Grass Of These Fields
Year: 2001
Duration (in minutes): 4'39;30'34;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: choral
Instruments: organ
Description: Commissioned by the Westfield Congregational Church, Danielson, CT.
Prague Sonata
Year: 2000
Duration (in minutes): 14'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: small chamber ensembles - 2 to 4 players, solo voice(s) with chamber ensemble
Instruments: any brass, any female voice, any high voice, any voice, organ, soprano, trombone
Description: The inspiration of ancient Greek music, verse, and movement provided the background setting, and the idea of 'blessedness' as wholeness is pursued. In this work, the positive but realistic theology of the Beatitudes concludes with an "outburst of joy," an homage to Messiaen.
Child's Garden of Music
Year: 2000
Duration (in minutes): Child'39;s
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: piano
Instruments: piano
Publisher: American Composers Alliance
Description: Intended primarily for intermediate level pianists, these miniatures are musical portraits of young friends and relatives of the composer. The conclusion of each piece gives the pianist something lively to do, while characterizing the portrait!
Triadic Tribute
Year: 2000
Duration (in minutes): 11'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: brass ensemble, brass quintet, larger chamber ensembles - more than 4 players
Instruments: any brass, horn, organ, trombone, trumpet, tuba
Description: Commissioned by the Connecticut State Music Teachers Association. A fanfare of triadic motives taken from hymns used throughout the church year. Towards the end of the one-movement work, the brass quintet spreads out through the audience, metaphorically sending their 'light' into the world.
Showings
Year: 2000
Duration (in minutes): 13'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: small chamber ensembles - 2 to 4 players, solo voice(s) with chamber ensemble
Instruments: organ, soprano, trombone
Description: Based on texts by Julian of Norwich (1342-1412 ca). Commissioned by The Foundation Adkins-Chit (Italy). Julian of Norwich wrote Showings, based on sixteen visions of God, occurring as she was extremely ill. As an anchoress, a solitary who is often pictured with her sole companion, a cat, her books were the first to be written in English by a woman.
Frauenliebe und -leben
Year: 1999
Duration (in minutes): 11'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: solo voice(s) with piano
Instruments: mezzo soprano, piano
Description: Poems by Adelbert von Chamisso.
Capricornus Caribbicus
Year: 1998
Duration (in minutes): 10'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: mixed instrument ensemble, mixed instrument trio, small chamber ensembles - 2 to 4 players
Instruments: flute, oboe, piano
Description: Commissioned by the Recording for the Blind & Dyslexic, Virginia Chapter. The fast, upbeat Danza reflects the influences of African rhythms impacting on the English contradance. The middle movement, calm and expectant, was inspired by the beatitude, "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God." Musical permutations to several popular songs enliven the final movement.
Hommage for Hildegard
Year: 1997
Duration (in minutes): 19'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: larger chamber ensembles - more than 4 players, solo voice(s) with chamber ensemble
Instruments: baritone voice, clarinet, flute, mezzo soprano, percussion, piano
Description: Based on the antiphon Caritas abundat by Hildegard von Bingen. Won the Miriam Gideon First Prize, 1998, IAWM Composition Competition.
Puzzle Preludes
Year: 1994
Duration (in minutes): 9'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: piano
Instruments: piano
Publisher: American Composers Alliance
Description: Commissioned by Craig R. Johnson. Each of the five Preludes centers around a quote, intentionally bent. The listener must guess the source, taken from composers of the Baroque, Classical, and Romantic periods.
Symphony No. 2 ("Lighthouse")
Year: 1994
Duration (in minutes): 15'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: orchestra and chamber orchestra
Publisher: American Composers Alliance
Description: This work represents an "Adieux!" at the turn of the millennium, through its structural use of musical quotes from European and American sources. A lighthouse as a metaphoric beacon provides the program for the first movement. The second movement is a Burlesque on a theme by Johann Stamitz (The composer honors Mannheim through this usage; she returns to Mannheim each spring.) An Elegia concludes the work, with the radiant lighthouse once more brought to mind in an incantation.
die Nachgeborenen (To Those Born Later)
Year: 1991
Duration (in minutes): 19'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: choral
Instruments: piano
Description: Poem by Bertolt Brecht (English translation by John Willett). German text used with permission of Suhrkamp Verlag. Available in German and English. On Capstone CD: CPS-8625
To Begin
Year: 1990
Duration (in minutes): 6'39;45'34;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: brass ensemble, brass quintet, larger chamber ensembles - more than 4 players
Instruments: any brass, horn, trombone, trumpet, tuba
Description: Inspired by a cummings phrase, "..the leaping greenly spirits of trees..", the frolicsome first movement gives way to a musical ballgame in Movement II. A boisterous concluding L„ndler sustains a light mood, while a theme from Beethoven's Fidelio is cited: "Es sucht der Bruder seine Brder." ("Brother seeks brothers.") On Capstone CD : CPS-8625
Gathering Threads
Year: 1990
Duration (in minutes): 6'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: solo instrument other than piano, solo woodwind instrument
Instruments: clarinet
Publisher: Peter Tonger Verlag
Description: A collection of fragmentary threads replaces a traditional motive at first. By the end, these threads become transformed by a Strauss quote. Capstone CD: CPS-8625
Birthday Bouquet
Year: 1990
Duration (in minutes): 12'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: solo voice(s) with piano
Instruments: any high voice, piano
Description: Poems by e.e. cummings, Christine Rossetti, William Butler Yeats. Capstone CD (CPS-8646). Also to be released on a Leonarda CD- fall, 2001.
Mass of Thanksgiving ("We Gather Together")
Year: 1987
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: piano
Instruments: flute, organ
Description: Available in English and Latin.
Klavier Double
Year: 1983
Duration (in minutes): 11'39;7'34;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: piano
Instruments: piano, tape
Publisher: American Composers Alliance
Description: The "double" of klavier (piano) and Synklavier (synthesizer) explains the title of this piece. Thematic fragments of Schumann's Fantasie in C, op. 17 become the basis for thematic and stylistic transformation. First Prize: Lipscomb Competition, 1983 Jerome Reed, pianist - Capstone CD: CPS-8625
Circling
Year: 1982
Duration (in minutes): 9'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: mixed instrument ensemble, small chamber ensembles - 2 to 4 players, solo instrument with piano, solo string with piano
Instruments: cello, piano
Publisher: Peter Tonger Verlag
Description: The geometric patterns involving circles at the beginning of each of the four movements mirror a relationship between two people; the performers map out these interpersonal moods. On Capstone CD: CPS-8625
Cantata Beatitudines
Year: 1982
Duration (in minutes): 18'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: choral
Instruments: organ
Publisher: American Composers Alliance
Description: The inspiration of ancient Greek music, verse, and movement provided the background setting, and the idea of 'blessedness' as wholeness is pursued. In this work, the positive but realistic theology of the Beatitudes concludes with an "outburst of joy," an homage to Messiaen.
Christmas, the Reason
Year: 1981
Duration (in minutes): 3'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: choral
Description: Poem used with permission of Sister Maura Eichner, S.S.N.D.
Drei Rilke Lieder
Year: 1958
Duration (in minutes): 8'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: solo voice(s) with piano
Instruments: any male voice, piano
Publisher: Peter Tonger Verlag
Description: Herbst, Herbsttag, Liebeslied
Christ Being Raised
Year: 1955
Duration (in minutes): 3'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: choral
Instruments: organ
Publisher: Arsis Press
...and the eagle flies... New American Orchestral Music
American Orchestral Music
Composers: Elizabeth R. Austin, Richard Brooks, F. DiArta Angeli
Label: Capstone Records
Product ID: CPS-8634
Buy URL: http://www.amazon.com/Eagle-Flies-American-Orchestral-Music/dp/B000001YV8
Buy URL 2: http://www.capstonerecords.org/CPS-8634.html
Spectra: A Concert of Music for Piano by Connecticut Composers
Music for Piano by Connecticut Composers
Composers: Elizabeth R. Austin, and others
Label: Capstone Records
Product ID: CPS-8732
Buy URL 2: http://www.capstonerecords.org/CPS-8732.html
Composition Feminine
Includes "Falcon Fantasy" by Elizabeth R. Austin. Conductor, Christoph Schumann
Composers: Elizabeth R. Austin, and others
Product ID: VKJK0422
Buy URL: https://www.amazon.com/Composition-Feminine-Tailleferre/dp/B0007OQCG0
Buy URL 2: https://www.prestomusic.com/classical/search?search_query=Composition%20Feminine
ROSE SONATA
Year: 2002
Duration (in minutes): 15'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: piano
Instruments: piano
Description: Commissioned by Jane Meredith Roche, with support from The Rockefeller Foundation. In the 'form' of a rose, this exploration of the rose' essence includes poetic texts by Bachmann, Goethe, Kleist, Rilke, Williams.
American Triptych
Year: 2001
Duration (in minutes): 7'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: piano
Instruments: piano
Publisher: American Composers Alliance
Description: With support from The Rockefeller Foundation. A rag, blues, and hoedown!
Wie Eine Blume"....orch-ideas and roses...
Year: 2001
Duration (in minutes): 17'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: larger chamber ensembles - more than 4 players, mixed instrument ensemble
Instruments: any woodwind, percussion
Like The Grass Of These Fields
Year: 2001
Duration (in minutes): 4'39;30'34;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: choral
Instruments: organ
Description: Commissioned by the Westfield Congregational Church, Danielson, CT.
Prague Sonata
Year: 2000
Duration (in minutes): 14'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: small chamber ensembles - 2 to 4 players, solo voice(s) with chamber ensemble
Instruments: any brass, any female voice, any high voice, any voice, organ, soprano, trombone
Description: The inspiration of ancient Greek music, verse, and movement provided the background setting, and the idea of 'blessedness' as wholeness is pursued. In this work, the positive but realistic theology of the Beatitudes concludes with an "outburst of joy," an homage to Messiaen.
Child's Garden of Music
Year: 2000
Duration (in minutes): Child'39;s
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: piano
Instruments: piano
Publisher: American Composers Alliance
Description: Intended primarily for intermediate level pianists, these miniatures are musical portraits of young friends and relatives of the composer. The conclusion of each piece gives the pianist something lively to do, while characterizing the portrait!
Triadic Tribute
Year: 2000
Duration (in minutes): 11'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: brass ensemble, brass quintet, larger chamber ensembles - more than 4 players
Instruments: any brass, horn, organ, trombone, trumpet, tuba
Description: Commissioned by the Connecticut State Music Teachers Association. A fanfare of triadic motives taken from hymns used throughout the church year. Towards the end of the one-movement work, the brass quintet spreads out through the audience, metaphorically sending their 'light' into the world.
Showings
Year: 2000
Duration (in minutes): 13'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: small chamber ensembles - 2 to 4 players, solo voice(s) with chamber ensemble
Instruments: organ, soprano, trombone
Description: Based on texts by Julian of Norwich (1342-1412 ca). Commissioned by The Foundation Adkins-Chit (Italy). Julian of Norwich wrote Showings, based on sixteen visions of God, occurring as she was extremely ill. As an anchoress, a solitary who is often pictured with her sole companion, a cat, her books were the first to be written in English by a woman.
Frauenliebe und -leben
Year: 1999
Duration (in minutes): 11'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: solo voice(s) with piano
Instruments: mezzo soprano, piano
Description: Poems by Adelbert von Chamisso.
Capricornus Caribbicus
Year: 1998
Duration (in minutes): 10'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: mixed instrument ensemble, mixed instrument trio, small chamber ensembles - 2 to 4 players
Instruments: flute, oboe, piano
Description: Commissioned by the Recording for the Blind & Dyslexic, Virginia Chapter. The fast, upbeat Danza reflects the influences of African rhythms impacting on the English contradance. The middle movement, calm and expectant, was inspired by the beatitude, "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God." Musical permutations to several popular songs enliven the final movement.
Hommage for Hildegard
Year: 1997
Duration (in minutes): 19'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: larger chamber ensembles - more than 4 players, solo voice(s) with chamber ensemble
Instruments: baritone voice, clarinet, flute, mezzo soprano, percussion, piano
Description: Based on the antiphon Caritas abundat by Hildegard von Bingen. Won the Miriam Gideon First Prize, 1998, IAWM Composition Competition.
Puzzle Preludes
Year: 1994
Duration (in minutes): 9'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: piano
Instruments: piano
Publisher: American Composers Alliance
Description: Commissioned by Craig R. Johnson. Each of the five Preludes centers around a quote, intentionally bent. The listener must guess the source, taken from composers of the Baroque, Classical, and Romantic periods.
Symphony No. 2 ("Lighthouse")
Year: 1994
Duration (in minutes): 15'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: orchestra and chamber orchestra
Publisher: American Composers Alliance
Description: This work represents an "Adieux!" at the turn of the millennium, through its structural use of musical quotes from European and American sources. A lighthouse as a metaphoric beacon provides the program for the first movement. The second movement is a Burlesque on a theme by Johann Stamitz (The composer honors Mannheim through this usage; she returns to Mannheim each spring.) An Elegia concludes the work, with the radiant lighthouse once more brought to mind in an incantation.
die Nachgeborenen (To Those Born Later)
Year: 1991
Duration (in minutes): 19'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: choral
Instruments: piano
Description: Poem by Bertolt Brecht (English translation by John Willett). German text used with permission of Suhrkamp Verlag. Available in German and English. On Capstone CD: CPS-8625
To Begin
Year: 1990
Duration (in minutes): 6'39;45'34;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: brass ensemble, brass quintet, larger chamber ensembles - more than 4 players
Instruments: any brass, horn, trombone, trumpet, tuba
Description: Inspired by a cummings phrase, "..the leaping greenly spirits of trees..", the frolicsome first movement gives way to a musical ballgame in Movement II. A boisterous concluding L„ndler sustains a light mood, while a theme from Beethoven's Fidelio is cited: "Es sucht der Bruder seine Brder." ("Brother seeks brothers.") On Capstone CD : CPS-8625
Gathering Threads
Year: 1990
Duration (in minutes): 6'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: solo instrument other than piano, solo woodwind instrument
Instruments: clarinet
Publisher: Peter Tonger Verlag
Description: A collection of fragmentary threads replaces a traditional motive at first. By the end, these threads become transformed by a Strauss quote. Capstone CD: CPS-8625
Birthday Bouquet
Year: 1990
Duration (in minutes): 12'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: solo voice(s) with piano
Instruments: any high voice, piano
Description: Poems by e.e. cummings, Christine Rossetti, William Butler Yeats. Capstone CD (CPS-8646). Also to be released on a Leonarda CD- fall, 2001.
Mass of Thanksgiving ("We Gather Together")
Year: 1987
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: piano
Instruments: flute, organ
Description: Available in English and Latin.
Klavier Double
Year: 1983
Duration (in minutes): 11'39;7'34;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: piano
Instruments: piano, tape
Publisher: American Composers Alliance
Description: The "double" of klavier (piano) and Synklavier (synthesizer) explains the title of this piece. Thematic fragments of Schumann's Fantasie in C, op. 17 become the basis for thematic and stylistic transformation. First Prize: Lipscomb Competition, 1983 Jerome Reed, pianist - Capstone CD: CPS-8625
Circling
Year: 1982
Duration (in minutes): 9'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: mixed instrument ensemble, small chamber ensembles - 2 to 4 players, solo instrument with piano, solo string with piano
Instruments: cello, piano
Publisher: Peter Tonger Verlag
Description: The geometric patterns involving circles at the beginning of each of the four movements mirror a relationship between two people; the performers map out these interpersonal moods. On Capstone CD: CPS-8625
Cantata Beatitudines
Year: 1982
Duration (in minutes): 18'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: choral
Instruments: organ
Publisher: American Composers Alliance
Description: The inspiration of ancient Greek music, verse, and movement provided the background setting, and the idea of 'blessedness' as wholeness is pursued. In this work, the positive but realistic theology of the Beatitudes concludes with an "outburst of joy," an homage to Messiaen.
Christmas, the Reason
Year: 1981
Duration (in minutes): 3'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: choral
Description: Poem used with permission of Sister Maura Eichner, S.S.N.D.
Drei Rilke Lieder
Year: 1958
Duration (in minutes): 8'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: solo voice(s) with piano
Instruments: any male voice, piano
Publisher: Peter Tonger Verlag
Description: Herbst, Herbsttag, Liebeslied
Christ Being Raised
Year: 1955
Duration (in minutes): 3'39;
Difficulty: Medium (college/community)
Category: choral
Instruments: organ
Publisher: Arsis Press
...and the eagle flies... New American Orchestral Music
American Orchestral Music
Composers: Elizabeth R. Austin, Richard Brooks, F. DiArta Angeli
Label: Capstone Records
Product ID: CPS-8634
Buy URL 2: http://www.capstonerecords.org/CPS-8634.html
Spectra: A Concert of Music for Piano by Connecticut Composers
Music for Piano by Connecticut Composers
Composers: Elizabeth R. Austin, and others
Label: Capstone Records
Product ID: CPS-8732
Buy URL 2: http://www.capstonerecords.org/CPS-8732.html
Composition Feminine
Includes "Falcon Fantasy" by Elizabeth R. Austin. Conductor, Christoph Schumann
Composers: Elizabeth R. Austin, and others
Product ID: VKJK0422
Buy URL 2: https://www.prestomusic.com/classical/search?search_query=Composition%20Feminine
