Diamond Transcriptions
Duration: 16:00
PROGRAM NOTES:
Joseph Diamond was a close friend and colleague of mine. His knowledge of music, both old and new, was phenomenal. He had perfect pitch, playing the piano by ear any piece: pop tunes, opera arias, old chants, the whole repertoire. He knew Latin, Greek, and the Romance languages making word puns or jokes at every dinner table conversation. Joe was a true musicologist, an intellectual, if one can say that in our flat political scene. He was young – forty, when he died of AIDS, on November 15, 1990. He was the envy of his professional colleagues.
The Diamond Transcriptions are settings of Joe’s meticulous work in notation classes at Harvard during his doctoral work. Joe transcribed these 16th century works as a tribute to long forgotten composers. I wrote these arrangements as a tribute to a great musician, who, because of a hideous disease, was never able to fulfill his beautiful musical talent.
Thanks to Michael Gillette for researching the dates of Joe’s transcriptions.
Program Listing:
I Sire don Dieu (anon)
II Dieu gard celle de deshonneur (anon)
III a. Prens ton con (Antoine dell’Abbate
b. Las il Faudra (Pierre Attaignant)
c. Pensez de Faire (anon)
IV Si jéusse Marion (anon)
-James Sellars