The H. Leslie Adams (b. 1932) Homepage is at:
http://www.hleslieadams.com H. Leslie Adams
is profiled at AfriClassical.com,
which features a comprehensive Works List by Dr. Dominique-René de Lerma, http://www.CasaMusicaledeLerma.com
H. Leslie Adams PIANO ETUDES Part I,
Maria Corley, YouTube
H. Leslie Adams PIANO ETUDES Part II,
Thomas Otten, YouTube
January 15, 2015
Daniel Hathaway
Cleveland composer H. Leslie Adams (left), an Oberlin Conservatory graduate, spent the decade from 1997 to 2007 writing his Twenty-six Etudes for Solo Piano. He
describes them in the liner notes to two recent recordings as “studies
of varying styles, moods, tonalities, and thematic natures — each
providing different technical challenges, while expressing my personal
sense of beauty.”
Separately, Adams
has written that one of his Oberlin composition teachers told him,
“Leslie, you have a unique gift for melody. Stick with it.” The composer
adds, “I took his great advice and have pursued a ‘bel canto path’
throughout my career.’
That career has been a long one — Adams is
now an octogenarian — and it has recently been crowned by the world
premiere performances of his complete Etudes at the University
of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Two recitals by pianists Maria Corley
and Thomas Otten provided the grand finale to the UNC music department’s
Etude Festival, held from October 26-November 2, 2014.
Corley had previously recorded the first dozen Etudes for
Albany Records. Otten followed that with volume two, recorded at Hill
Hall Auditorium at UNC in December, 2013 and January 2014 (also on the
Albany label). Though we have Otten’s CD in hand, this article is based
on a DVD we received of the live performances last November 1 and 2.
In
a Broad Street Review blog entry, Jamaican-born, Canadian pianist Maria
Thompson Corley, who did her undergraduate studies at the University of
Alberta and won her master’s and doctoral degrees from Juilliard, notes
that the Etudes “explore all registers of the piano. The
writing is often thick, with multiple climactic moments and, as one
would expect with etudes, a wide variety of technical demands…There is
certainly dissonance, but Leslie writes from the heart. Of course, you
don’t have to be neo-romantic with touches of jazz and popular music to
write from the heart. But in Leslie’s case, that’s how things turned
out.”
Comments by email:
1) Dear Bill, Recent post most appreciated. [H. Leslie Adams]
2) Thanks! :) [Maria Corley]
Comments by email:
1) Dear Bill, Recent post most appreciated. [H. Leslie Adams]
2) Thanks! :) [Maria Corley]
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