Summer Solstice

Summer Solstice is a 19-minute concerto in three movements, composed for solo clarinet with a colorfully-textured string orchestra. Dorff’s joy in writing for his own instrument is readily heard in the warm cantabile writing and gracefully idiomatic passagework. Drawing inspiration from the elegance of Mozart’s concerto and the rhythmic grit of Copland’s, Dorff’s concerto is a true hybrid of jazz-inspired language with classical form and counterpoint. The Philadelphia Inquirer has written, "Summer Solstice is light without being insubstantial, melodic without being obvious. It has an invariably American sound." Orchestral score and parts are available on rental.

In 1986 I began a for Clarinet and String Quartet, composing two movements of the projected three that year. As a clarinetist, I'd always been inspired by the Brahms and Mozart quintets, and I'd also been freshly inspired by Eddie Daniels' recent recordings of jazz clarinet with symphony orchestra. Work on the Lyric Quintet was interrupted soon after the second movement, as I became a father for the first time and then was fortunate to have several years of commissions with premiere deadlines; as a result I had to put the Lyric Quintet aside until 1992. Coming back six years later, I decided this would be better as a Concerto for Clarinet and String Orchestra. The larger string ensemble allowed thick jazz chords to be played more richly and smoothly, allowed contrasts between solo strings and tuttis, and added the advantages of having a conductor. Starting life as intimately blended chamber music rather than as a concerto, Movements 1 & 2 use the clarinet as a balanced ensemble member at least as much as a soloist, and there are many solo passages for strings. Only the third movement was originally conceived for full string orchestra, leading this final movement to more dramatic contrasts between clarinet and strings. The music has a light, summery feel, and the friendly relationship of the clarinet to the strings somehow struck me as a solstice-like meeting point, therefore the poetic title Summer Solstice, with Concerto in the subtitle. Summer Solstice was premiered in Philadelphia on March 31, 1994 by Orchestra 2001 conducted by James Freeman, with Arne Running as clarinet soloist.

Summer Solstice is a 19-minute concerto in three movements, composed for solo clarinet with a colorfully-textured string orchestra. Dorff’s joy in writing for his own instrument is readily heard in the warm cantabile writing and gracefully idiomatic passagework. Drawing inspiration from the elegance of Mozart’s concerto and the rhythmic grit of Copland’s, Dorff’s concerto is a true hybrid of jazz-inspired language with classical form and counterpoint. The Philadelphia Inquirer has written, "Summer Solstice is light without being insubstantial, melodic without being obvious. It has an invariably American sound." Orchestral score and parts are available on rental.