Program Notes

Ursula Mamlock, composer of Five Bagatelles, was born in Berlin, immigrated to Ecuador, and while still a teen-ager won a full scholarship at New York's Mannes School, where she studied with George Szell. Among her other teachers were Roger Sessions, Stefan Wolpe, Ralph Shapey and Gunther Schuller. Her works have been performed at major festivals, such as Tanglewood, and by prominent ensembles such as the Group for Contemporary Music, ISCM, the Da Capo Chamber Players and the New Music Consort. She has taught composition at New York University and the City University of New York, and is currently a member of the composition faculty at the Manhattan School of Music.

She writes: "I aim to create a sound surface which displays such basic feelings as, for example, joy, sadness, calmness and elation; these are couched, however, in a technique which may make repeated hearings of a work necessary before the feelings become obvious. I sometimes enjoy working with organized pitch groups and time relations. While I often use the principle of continuous variation as a compositional method in my longer works, I allow some sections to return, preferring rounded forms with large formal divisions to through-composed forms."

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