Henry Cowell

3 Irish Legends

Henry Dixon Cowell was an American composer, music theorist, pianist, teacher, publisher, and impresario. In the early 1950's, his music was summed up by Virgil Thomson as having "a wider range in both expression and technique than that of any other living composer...No other composer of our time has produced a body of works so radical and so normal, so penetrating and so comprehensive." Cowell's Three Irish Legends remains one of the composer's most performed and recognizable compositions, and is noted for its striking use of tone clusters. The work is comprised of three movements: 1. The Tides of Manaunaun, 2. The Hero Sun, and 3. The Voice of Lir.