JAVS Summer 1998

84

NEW WORKS

"Invocation for Violin and Viola," by Robert Mann. Merion Music, Bryn Mawr, 1997. Theodore Presser, Sole Representative. $4.50. The last two issues of this journal have in cluded "music inserts," and it's good to see this feature continuing, thanks to the gen erosity of Theodore Presser Co. (pp. 49-51). "The Invocation" by Robert Mann is quite different from the previous morsels by Fritz Becker, found in these pages. Robert Mann, well known to us as the long-time first violin ist of the Juilliard String Quartet, has recently retired from that post which he filled with such distinction. Probably few of us think of him as a composer, but he certainly is that, as this duet for violin and viola clearly demon strates. It was written in 1980 for his daugh ter's wedding and can also be performed by piano and violin or cello and piano. The har monic style is completely nontriadic, filled with uncompromising dissonance and un expected melodic direction, recalling the vocabulary of Elliot Carter or Carl Ruggles. It's atonal, but if this is composed in some sys tematic way, the method isn't obvious. Per haps he just thinks in these harmonic terms. String Syllabus, Volume 1, Revised 1997, ed. David A Littrell. American String Teachers Association, cl997. Tichenor Publishing, Di vision ofT.I.S., Inc., PO Box 669, Blooming ton, IN 47402-0669. (Available from MENC Publications, 1806 Robert Fulton Dr., Reston, VA 22091. Tel. 1-800-828-0229. $18.00 for ASTA/MENC members, plus shipping and handling.) String Syllabus is a graded listing of pub lished methods, studies, and "repertoire" for violin, viola, cello, and double bass. There is a section called "Ensembles" which lists graded

Rhythmically it's complex, but the intentions are obvious and expressive. Essentially it is a slow and quiet piece, built in short sections with definite cadences. Since it is a wedding piece, one wonders about symbolic intentions. There are two per formers, and the first thirty measure's are almost like a dialog, with the two instruments answering one another, in rather complex rhythmic counterpoint. Including the cadence starting in measure thirty, both lines are almost in rhythmic unison through the end of the work. Is this a perfect union symbol? The measures that have harmonics show how to play the harmonics, not the notes that will sound, a natural choice for a composer with so much performance experience. It would be helpful to have further fingering and bowing editing, especially from such an authority. But the expression editing is ample and unambiguous. Wouldn't it be wonderful to attend a wed ding where this work served as the invoca tion? There are some practical performance problems, but if you have Robert Mann and Raphael Hillyer as performers, it certainly would be more fun than "Oh Promise Me." material for violin, viola, or cello, and any combination of these three. There is a separate section listing string ensemble publications that include double bass. For those of us who teach, this guide, in a recent edition, is a most practical help. String Syllabus has been produced by ASTA since the early fifties, and it has been revised every ten years or so since then. The 1963 edition shows that a major purpose was to facilitate standards and procedures for the ASTA ''Achievement Examinations," which were done on a local and state level through out the U.S. The secondary purpose was