This site is home to Alea Publishing & Recording, specializing in music for the bass clarinet.
We offer a growing catalog of creative, artistic transcriptions and new works for bass clarinet solo & ensemble.
For a physical CD, add to your cart here! This album is also available on streaming services such as Spotify and Apple Music.
John Verrall (1908-2001) was a 20th century American composer whose body of work includes a wide variety of instrumental, orchestral, chamber and vocal music, as well as three operas and a film score. During his long tenure on the faculty at the University of Washington, John Verrall was a beloved teacher and mentor to hundreds of young composers and performers, including Michael Davenport, then a young clarinetist at the university. It was through her father and duo partner Michael that Kimberly became aware of Verrall's powerful Piano Sonata. Her fascination with the work led to the discovery of more, and finally to this recording.
Kimberly Davenport is best known for her piano work with Duo Alea, which has released three critically acclaimed CDs. The program on this CD was conceived in the same spirit as these earlier recordings - with a passion for bringing to life powerful music which has remained largely and undeservedly 'in the drawer' - unpublished and underperformed.
For additional perspective on John Verrall, see the blog post John Verrall: a Triumph for the Persistently Nice, by Seattle-based musician, writer, and researcher Peter Nelson-King. The article provides an excellent overview of Verrall's life and work, and includes a mention of Kimberly's recording!
Kim Davenport
President
Duo Alea, the father-daughter duo of Michael and Kimberly Davenport, began performing music for bass clarinet and piano in 1996. As performers searching for new repertoire and teachers working with students eager to develop as performers, it quickly became clear that there was a need for more repertoire featuring the bass clarinet. Filling this need became the mission of Alea Publishing & Recording.
Since our first publication in 1997, the Alea catalog has now grown to include over 300 titles. We pride ourselves on the accuracy and quality of our sheet music, as well as our ability to ship directly to customers around the world.
We are proud of the diversity of our catalog in terms of the inclusion of works by composers and arrangers from around the world. We are interested in continuing to expand this diversity, representing musical ideas from around the world.
Following Michael's passing in 2019, Kim has taken over solo management of Alea Publishing. In 2020, Alea established the Dolphy Prize, an annual composition award for new works for bass clarinet by black composers.
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