Thursday, May 29, 2008

Fred Onovwerosuoke: 'The first African composer to write for the alto flute'




[African Art Music for Flute: The Music of Ndondana, Nketia, Onovwerosuoke, Tamusuza, and Uzoigwe; Wendy Hymes, flutes; Darryl Hollister, piano; AMP Records AGCD 2081 (2008)]

AfriClassical has previously posted: “African Art Music for Flute: The Music of Ndondana, Nketia, Onovwerosuoke, Tamuzusa, and Uzoigwe”. Today we focus on Dr. Fred Onovwerosuoke, composer of the first three works on the CD, who also founded the St. Louis African Chorus in 1994 and remains its Director. Dr. Wendy Hymes, who plays flutes on the recording, writes in the liner notes at AfricanChorus.org:
Fred Onovwerosuoke’s diverse background gave rise to a varied compositional style. Born in Ghana to Nigerian parents, he has traveled to more than thirty African countries doing field work in African traditional musics, played violin, piano, organ, guitar and became an experienced choir and instrumental ensemble conductor.”

Wendy Hymes writes further: Fred Onovwerosuoke: Three Pieces for Flute and Piano (Tracks 1-3)” “The piece is a musical setting of a poem by the composer, and uses a combination of pentatonic, hexatonic, and twelve-tone harmonies to portray the poem’s imagery of a forest at night and its bird calls. Two improvisatory sounding flute cadenzas accompany the narration of the poem. Rushing flourishes by the flute and piano at the end of the piece portray the forest’s now awakened joyous birds. Iroro, meaning reminiscences, and draws from the initiation dances of the Igbe priests and priestesses, a cult of the River Goddess in Nigeria. Iroro portrays xylophones and large bamboo flutes in the accompanying piano, with the lead flute played by the alto flute. The first African composer to write for the alto flute, Onovwerosuoke harnesses its haunting timbre in modal and improvisatory-sounding melodies to reflect the trance-like state of the ceremony participants.”







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