About the Work

We thank the composer for sharing a few notes about her work:

The Suite for Clarinet Quartet was commissioned in 1992 by UK clarinetist Michael Bryant, who requested a light-hearted piece to be performed informally at one of the many clarinet 'play-days' he organized throughout the year. This therefore provided me a good opportunity to preserve the melodies from a children's musical I had written a year earlier in 1991. This musical, Sea Shanty for a King, was commissioned and performed over three afternoons by Herne Hill Primary School in London. The story, script and song lyrics were written by head teacher Phyll Bennett. It was such a success that I wished to collect the tunes into an easily playable concert piece. This Suite is the result.

The story features an old musician who lives alone in a ramschakle hut by the sea. One day he writes a sea shanty tune, but three of the notes manage to mischievously escape from the tune and, to their horror, get swept out to sea. In the deep, wild ocean they encounter many sea creatures and exciting adventures during their struggle to find their way home. Their tune needed to be again complete and their old 'music man' happy once more.

Each movement of the Suite uses one, sometimes two, tunes from the songs, constructed together to make a simple form. The fifth movement, 'Finale', is based on the main theme of the musical, the sea shanty itself. I hope you enjoy playing this piece as much as I have enjoyed writing it.

Scored for Clarinet 1 in B-flat/Clarinet in E-flat; Clarinets 2 and 3 in B-flat; Bass Clarinet. Extended-range instrument required. Score: 51 pages, spiral bound; Parts: 12 pages each, staple bound.

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About the Composer

Geraldine Green was born in 1967. Her interest in music was awakened when she was 7 years old, during a holiday when she stayed with a family of musicians including the composer John Dunn. At 11 she began the clarinet and piano at the Belfast School of Music, where she studied until the age of 18. It was during this time that Geraldine's passion for composition began, and she began writing her first piano pieces and studying orchestration with the help and encouragement of her teacher Gerry Deignan.

In 1986 Geraldine went to the London College of Music to study clarinet with David Campbell and piano with Renalda Mackie. Following a 3 year degree course, she then completed a post graduate diploma in Film Music under Francis Shaw. By then the urge to write music could no longer be contained and in the years that followed she wrote a number of works. These included a Recorder Concertino, the Bass Clarinet Concerto, a Septet for string quintet, flute and harpsichord, and a concerto for B-flat clarinet and orchestra. During these years, Geraldine also wrote four musicals for Herne Hill Primary School in London.

Throughout the 1990s Geraldine taught clarinet and piano at Ibstock Place School in Roehapton, London, and this soon led to her producing orchestrations and arrangements for the school's orchestra, band and choir. Through this work she met Peter Morris who commissioned her to write a piece for his Thameside Clarinet Choir. The 3 movement Divertissement was the result. A clarinet quintet, commissioned by Michael Bryant for his clarinet 'play days' was soon to follow.

After a break in music writing to start a family, March 2008 saw Geraldine return to writing with a seven movement piece for piano, 'Miscellany'. The year 2009 saw the world premiere of her flute concerto, performed by flautist Gary Woolf (who commissioned the work) and the Chiltern Camerata in High Wycombe, UK, and conducted by composer Simon Lambros.

Geraldine is now married and lives in the UK with her family. She regularly plays clarinet and cello with local symphony orchestras, and also enjoys playing and writing traditional Irish Folk music. For further details on Geraldine Green please visit her website at GeraldineGreen.co.uk or at OakMountMusic.co.uk.