So fulfilling — the recording of my three string quartets, on the Acis label. Wonderfully played by the Terra String Quartet, who, while we were editing the album, won the Naumburg Chamber Music Competition, a prestigious honor for young ensembles.
How to hear the album:
On streaming services. Or right here, below.
Or from an Acis press page, where you can download the CD booklet and our press release (and get special downloads for reviewers and radio stations.
As I wrote in the CD liner notes: “Three string quartets, written at different times and for different reasons, but which come together as if they were meant to be heard in a single flow.”
Click to hear each piece — and for each one there’s something special, a visual animation of the music, by the magical Stephen Malinowski.
Quartet for Anne (2001)
A surprise birthday present for my wife, Anne Midgette. Released as a single in February, played on classical radio, available on streaming services. (5 minutes)
The music sounds so warm, and full of love, as Terra plays it.
Learn more, including how I built this piece from other music of mine that Anne knew
See Stephen Manilowski’s visual animation
The Remembered Song (2018)
A spiritual piece, about a song we heard in paradise, but remember only dimly now. Released as a single June 6, available on streaming services. (8 minutes)
The music, with its dream of paradise, seems to dissolve into mist, with Terra playing on the edge of silence.
See Stephen Malinowski’s visual animation
Mahler Variations (2004)
Variations on a Mahler theme, a narrative of my life, moving through many musical styles, with tributes to musical works and other things I love. (27 minutes)
The Mahler theme — the opening of the last movement of the Third Symphony — creates a hush around it, when it starts, in my arrangement for string quartet.
The piece goes through many changes, with recurring silences, including near the end a variation where time stops, and the musicians don’t play at all (my tribute to John Cage)
This recording, and everything involved with it, was a warm collaboration.
To quote the quartet, whose violinists had taken one of the courses I taught at Juilliard:
Throughout this process, Greg went from a beloved professor to respected colleague and friend.
It is no wonder that his music is so poignant and can speak to so many, given the incredibly rich life he has lived.