This is the first piece of music I have ever had premiered by a musician that wasn't...me. This very talented 1st year clarinetist, Nathan Lam, performed my piece for solo Bb Clarinet in May 2009. He did a fantastic job considering the complexity of this piece, my poor clarinet writing and his 2-3 week preparation. He actually improvised a lot of it, and probably around 3:00-30 this can really be noticed. I do not have the score in finale/pdf form just yet because I had hand written it on A3 paper...so that's another reason why I commend him - my handwriting is shocking. The piece is called Ten because it is based on the bible story about the lost coin. The opening melodic phrase symbolise the 9 coins that are in the woman's possession and throughout the piece she frantically tries to search for the 10 coin, which, btw, she finds at the last note: G (sounds A). I tried to capture the emotion/frenzy of searching for something that is lost, and the ending phrase (the falling flute-like arpeggios in a major-ish figure) is kind of like the celebration of finding the tenth coin. Of course, you can interpret this anyway you want, and perhaps one day I'll upload the score, but I only just rediscovered the recording, so I thought I'd upload it PS I lol'd at the sneeze too hahaha.Finally, YC has fixed the upload feature. Thanks!
Ten - Solo Bb Clarinet