Flexing the Canon: Flex Works for Clarinet, Horn, and Bassoon

Name: Flexing the Canon: Flex Works for Clarinet, Horn, and Bassoon
Start: 2025-09-07T15:00:00-04:00
Location: Towson University Center For The Arts

Schedule

Sun, 07 Sep, 2025 at 03:00 pm

UTC-04:00

Location

Towson University Center For The Arts | Towson, MD

Sunday, September 7, 2025
3:00 p.m.
Towson Center for the Arts
Recital Hall
Explore a mix of classical works about love, teas, zoo animals, and meditation written for clarinet, horn, and bassoon. Performers include Towson University clarinet professor Natalie Groom and guest collaborators Kat Robinson (horn) and Qun Ren (bassoon). Hear world premieres and commissions designed as “flex” chamber music (chamber music that can be flexible and played by many combinations of instruments). The program is ~60 minutes without intermission.
What is flex chamber music? Maybe you’ve heard of flex band pieces, where the parts are “flexible” enough to be played by many combinations of instruments. These are particularly helpful for incomplete or unbalanced instrumentations. This program includes commissions that were initiated to grow this body of repertoire and create unique performance opportunities for students and teachers through “flex” chamber music (flexing the canon).
Repertoire includes works by:
Hiroaki Kataoka
Cherise Leiter*
Tyler Mazone*
Beata Moon
Wilfred Roberts
Jennifer Stevenson*
Naoya Wada
Klaus Wallendorf
*denotes premiere performance
During the pandemic, flex band music grew in popularity, but not as much time and attention has been put into creating flex chamber music. Most of the works on this program are specifically designed to facilitate other instrumentations, such as exchanging clarinet for viola, horn for alto saxophone, or bassoon for cello.
Though an unusual instrument combination, clarinet, horn, and bassoon make a beautiful trio. With each instrument having a very warm, welcoming, and sonorous mid-range, the ability to meld into another voice and yet emerge into distinct textures is remarkable.