William Bland's sonatas frequently employ a whirling and propulsive keyboard style, with dance rhythms and styles like waltzes, tango, rags, and chaconnes being prominent.
Performer Biography
Kevin Gorman, the pianist on this recording, was awarded the Grand Lauréat in the Festival de Musique de Royaume, Québec, and founded Great Bear Editions for contemporary piano music.
Interpretation
Pianist Kevin Gorman believes the essence of William Bland's sonatas is passion, which compels him to reciprocate the intensity of their composition.
Composer's Artistic Vision
William Bland, the composer, stated that the individual motivation for each sonata varied, including visual imagery, literature, and pure music.
Compositional Technique
The sonatas by William Bland merge simple and complex, popular and classical, romantic and modernist elements, employing both diatonic and atonal language freely.
Composer Biography
William Bland studied composition with notable figures such as Ernst Krenek, Benjamin Lees, Richard Rodney Bennett, and Earle Brown.
Composition History
William Bland's cycle of 24 piano sonatas, one in each major and minor key, was composed between 1998 and 2014, filling 431 pages of manuscript.
You might also enjoy...
Weinberg: Complete Piano Works, Vol. 4
Prokofiev: Visions fugitives & Sonates pour piano Nos. 1, 2, 3, 6 & 7
