Shades of Red - for Viola

Composer's Note:

Shades of Red was commissioned by the Friday Morning Music Club Foundation as the required new piece for the 2015 Johansen International Strings Competition. The requirements were that it be short (3-4 minutes), and written so the performers would be able to demonstrate both technical assurance and musicality. I was also to write something that, with minor adjustments and transpositions, could be performed by violin, viola, or cello.

The work is in three short sections, like miniature movements of a multi-movement work: dramatic, followed by warm and lyrical, concluding with fast and light. To unify the work, I evolved musical materials from the opening sounds. The title came last in the process, as a way of proposing one possible visual image evoked by the music. Shades of Red then suggested to me the titles of the three sections, “red hot,” “darkly glowing,” and “like wisps of smoke from dying embers.”