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Highlights |
Excerpt
(.mp3 - 00:18 - 294kb)
© 2000 Christopher M. Wright
All Rights Reserved - This material may not
be republished, rebroadcast, rewritten, redistributed, resold, or manipulated in
any form.
What They're Saying
"It's very French." - Silver Spring,
Maryland
When I started to get serious about writing music in 2000, I wanted something simple to get back into it. I had previously been listening to a lot of music at the University of Maryland music library. A Poulenc chorale tune stuck in my head and I decided to see what I could do with it.
'C'est la Petit' Fill' du Prince' is about a young woman who figures it's time to fall in love and get married. She goes down to the pier where the ship is bringing back the navy boys from overseas. She sees one she likes but, alas, her love is not returned. The last line goes something like this: 'It's easy to return money that's been borrowed, but you can't very well return a heart that's been given.' (Cole Porter, call your office.)
Poulenc's original work simply repeats the melody a dozen times. I wrote a new 7-minute piece with new instrumentation, new harmonies, new countermelodies, and new free sections that are completely original. Then there was the process of organizing my thoughts, with the result being a completely new structure.
French-born composer Francis Poulenc died in 1963. I approached the present-day copyright holders to see whether they were interested in a deal that would allow me to distribute my 'Fantasia' (known as a 'derivative work' in the copyright law) to the public. They declined my request and I decided not to force the issue through compulsory licensing (at least for now). So you'll have to be invited to one of my dinner parties to hear the whole thing. Meanwhile, enjoy this excerpt. It's completely original. There's not a note of Poulenc in it.
Further discussion - Composer Roundtable No. 1