Roger Steptoe
4 Shakespeare Sonnets
for baritone and string orchestra or piano
Roger Steptoe
4 Shakespeare Sonnets
for baritone and string orchestra or piano
- Instrumentation Medium Voice and String orchestra
- Composer Roger Steptoe
- Edition Score
- Publisher Editions Bim
- Order no. BIM-V103B
ships within 1-2 weeks
Description:
Four Shakespeare Sonnets for baritone and string orchestra was composed to celebrate the 450th anniversary of William Shakespeare's birth in 2014. For more than 40 years I have enthusiastically composed countless vocal works, to subtle poetry and for voices in all registers, but the present work is my first foray into the world of a solo voice with string orchestra accompaniment. I chose these four sonnets for their common theme of love - the pain and cruelty of the soul, enchantment, lust, immortality... Various themes and harmonic sequences unite the four love testaments in their numerous forms. The fourth sonnet is the most significant, with its lush and sensual harmonies, finely distributed in the strings. The world premieres and first performances of the version with string orchestra took place in England in May, June and November 2014, with the Orchestra of the Swan, the Welsh Chamber Orchestra and baritone Jeremy Huw Williams under the direction of Anthony Hose.