John Burge

Commissioner: La Jeunesse Northumberland Girls' Choir, Marie Anderson and Dierdre Morrell

Premiere (first complete performance):Amabile Youth Singers, John Barrons, conductor; London, ON; Nov. 21, 1998

Duration: ca. 8 minutes (each movement is under 4 minutes)

Program Note: Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue was commissioned by La Jeunesse Northumberland Girls' Choir, Marie Anderson and Dierdre Morrell, co-directors in 1997 for the choir's European tour.  At their request, they wanted a demanding work that would demonstrate the choir's virtuosity and the resultant work has been used by many choirs in a competition setting as a result.  As the title implies, these two movements are entirely instrumental in character and demand of the singers an exactness in pitch and rhythm that is uncompromising.  The title is borrowed from a popular baroque composition for organ or harpsichord that modern-day consensus reveals to be misattributed to J. S. Bach.  In the Burge composition, the Fantasy unfolds slowly with the vocal lines often dividing into complex four-, five-, or even six-note chords.  The Fugue, on the other hand, remains in three parts throughout and is unrelenting in its energetic drive towards the ending.

Interesting Observation: The text for this work is simply vocalization on syllables made up by John Burge which makes this the only vocal work for which he wrote the "words."  Truth be told, it probably took him far too long to find the best syllable.

To purchase this score, please see Boosey and Hawkes.