Clarinet Quintet: In Prairial and Thermidor

for clarinet quintet
This beautiful chamber work takes its inspiration from an artist's book by the Scottish artist Ian Hamilton Finlay, 'A Litany A Requiem'. This book lists on alternate red, white, and blue paper plants from the month of Prairial (May-June in the French Revolutionary Calendar), set against a list of revolutionaries guillotined in the month of Thermidor (July-August). The work is in two movements - 'A Litany for Prairial' which is fast, lively, and (mostly) pastoral; and 'A Requiem for Thermidor' which is slow, largely subdued, and funereal.