A recital of world premieres of The Meeks Duo arrangements!
Yesterday, we played a private concert at a senior home in Vancouver, Crofton Manor. The program was made up entirely of my (Scott) arrangements, made during the last two years, and all pieces were world premiere performances! Here are a few notes on each piece (many of them will be coming soon to YouTube!):
1. Vivaldi Spring: we played a different arrangement of this during our livestream recital phase at the start of the pandemic, but I wanted to write a simpler version, more faithful to the Baroque orchestra sound.
2. Beethoven/Howard Fly Me To The Moon-Light Sonata is a mash-up of Beethoven’s famous sonata and the jazz standard, something nobody has done before! A few months ago, one of our supporters requested a 4-hand version of Moonlight Sonata, but rather than make a transcription of it, I decided to combine it with Fly Me To The Moon, something I’ve always wanted to arrange. I compressed all three movements into one continuous composition, and had a lot of fun writing it! I kept Beethoven’s original figurations and rhythmic patterns in all three movements, but changed the harmonies and melodies to fit Fly Me To The Moon.
3. Lemare Andantino (Moonlight and Roses): We were asking for “Night music” suggestions during our livestream concerts, and one of our supporters mentioned this piece, which had never heard of before. It’s originally for organ, and was made into a pop song (resulting in a lawsuit, since they didn’t get the composer’s permission first!). It’s a beautifully simple work and we hope it gets more recognition!
4. Delibes Flower Duet: a famous operatic soprano duet, featuring the two female voices in the primo part, and the orchestra in the secondo.
5. Chopin Piano Concerto 2, 2nd movement: one of the most beautiful slow movements ever written, we played another version of this earlier but I wanted to make my own to add a few parts missing from the other arrangement and to make the fast runs easier to coordinate between the two players.
6. Rachmaninov Romance: the heart of the energetic and powerful 2nd Suite for 2 pianos, I wanted to turn this into a more intimate 1-piano 4-hand arrangement. This is one of the most complex arrangements I’ve done because of the multitude of voices in both parts, but we think it works very well on one piano!
7. Happy Birthday Rachmaninov: the first of my Concerto birthday arrangements, I wrote this in one day because I was so excited about the idea of using the 2nd concerto as a basis for it!
