02 March 2007

Crumb: Dream Sequence

Dream Sequence (Images II) for violin, cello, piano, percussion (one player), and off-stage glass harmonica (two players) (1976): Exquisite work of about 15 minutes for piano, violin, cello, percussion and two offstage "glass harmonica" players. Over a drone from the offstage group the varios other players play "circle music" uncoordinated murmurings, flutterings and wisps of melody (including a fragment from "Will There Be Any Stars in My Crown?). A true gorgeous mediative success, Crumb really creates a modd and stays with it in the way that he does with the Lux Aeterna, and so seldom does in his other more aphoristic works. I feel like this is a special place in Crumb's work that he only seldom allows himself to go to.

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