Suite Hartt | three guitar solos by Frank A. Wallace

Suite Hartt was conceived after the completion of the chamber suite As It Could Be, my largest work to date. Two solos were included in the suite, but they begged a third when played alone, out of their original context. Thus was born Shadow of the Sun, the completion of this subset of the original chamber music:

Cry Among the Clouds
A Wisp in the Dark
Shadow of the Sun

Eight works composed in winter 2014 comprise As It Could Be, a chamber suite commissioned by and dedicated to the Hartt School of Music Guitar Department and its founder/director Richard Provost on the occasion of their 50th anniversary. The project was conceived at dinner following a concert of the New England Guitar Quartet at the Hartt Festival in the summer of 2013. My interest in writing chamber music melded perfectly with Dick’s desire to plan a celebration/concert for the Anniversary. Dick suggested using The Man with the Blue Guitar by Wallace Stevens (a resident of Hartford, CT) as a source of lyrics for a song to include. This incredible testimony to art and its role in changing society became inspiration for the music and titles. The possibilities for chamber music with guitar, guitar orchestra and ensembles are only beginning to be fully realized.

Thank you Dick (and all your colleagues) who brought the guitar out of the dark ages and into a brilliant new community of creativity and progress through your courage, hard work and vision. Thanks to the Augustine Foundation for their support of this project. Let us imagine a future as it could be: “Things as they are / Are changed upon the blue guitar.” [Stevens]

Copyright ©2014 Frank A. Wallace
Cover photography and design by Nancy Knowles
All rights reserved.