SELECTED WORKS: with Type = 'Solos'
Solos
Around the Stage in 25 Minutes During Which a Variety of Instruments Are Struck (1970)
This work requires one performer and sixty percussion instruments. Its original title—Timbres—captures Weinzweig’s goal to explore “the colour spectrum of percussion through the manipulation of beaters and hands on various striking areas of wood, metal, and membrane instruments.”
Solos
Riffs for solo Flute (1974)
Weinzweig describes the work as follows: "Riffs for solo flute reflects the characteristics of the “many moods of jazz blues”—the improvised manner within a twelve-bar melodic form, the slow, sad, melancholy feeling interrupted with highly-charged “shouts” and a dialogue of call-and-response patterns coloured by bent pitch inflections. The work is composed in twelve segments of various durations related only the Blues style and a recurring long-tone cadence on a low flute note G."
Solos
Contrasts for Guitar (1976)
While technically straightforward, Contrasts for Guitar poses a musical challenge to the player: with numerous slow, sparse, and often repetitious melodies, each note must be intentional and appropriately expressed. The use of serial techniques and pitch-class sets (a collection of pitches) demonstrates formal details that for the most part cannot be heard. It is the performer’s role to draw out the tonal and motivic relationships and numerous contrasts in tempo, technique, texture, and tone within and across the six sections.
Solos
Eighteen Pieces for Guitar (1980)
Eighteen Pieces for Guitar explores sounds and techniques that are idiomatic to the instrument, such as strummed chords, tremolo, and arpeggios. These eighteen pieces allow the performer to explore a range of moods and styles, from the lyrical “Arioso” to the call-and-response and minor thirds of “Manor Road Blues.”
Solos
15 Pieces for Harp (1983)
The descriptive titles of the individual pieces given an indication of the diverse styles Weinzweig uses, his humour, and the many different moods he has portrayed in the set; these moods and many different colours emerge from the harp through lean, pared down textures and modern playing techniques. The results are both challenging and rewarding for player and audience alike.
Solos
Cadenza (1986)
Cadenza is a virtuosic showpiece for the clarinet, with large leaps, fast scalar passages, contrasting dynamics and articulations, and extended technique.
Solos
Tremologue for Solo Viola (1987)
Tremologue allows the violist to explore the beauty and warmth of the instrument through the mostly slow and contemplative sections. Weinzweig explains: "The title embodies the central characteristics of the piece—the tremulous tremolo and the dialogue. ... The work is cast in the form of an assemblage of fourteen segments on a succession of contrasting relationships. Yet, by means of a stylistic binding of recurring segments and the tremolo, its seemingly random course may be formed by the listener into a cohesive whole."
Solos
Riffs II (1991)
Riffs II consists of five segments. The trombone explores timbral subtleties, not only through the use of mutes, but also indications for cracked tone, hand pops on the mouthpiece, and varied vibrato. Dynamics and articulations of each note have been carefully and precisely notated; such detail requires great attention by the player.
Solos
Belaria (1992)
This “beautiful song” was composed to demonstrate the expressive qualities of the unaccompanied violin. Harmonics, double stops, sul tasto, pizzicato, and mutes create a compelling timbral variety.
Solos
Riffs III (1992)
Riffs III consists of six segments that exhibit textural and timbral variety, achieved through detailed articulations, dynamic contrasts, use of the plunger mute, and extended technique (e.g., mouthpiece hand pop). The trumpet displays a wide expressive range, notated variously in the score as “boldly”, “cantabile,” “tenderly,” “graceful,” “menacing,” and “nervously.”