Sunday, August 06, 2006

Benjamin Franklin ... Composer?

Is it possible that a man that is well known for everything from politics to science, printing and writing also composed music?

From Playbill Arts:
"It is well established that Franklin played several musical instruments and enjoyed music. The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports that a Pennsylvania professor of music believes Franklin was also the composer of an unusual quartet whose author has never been ascertained.

The paper says that Kenneth Sarch, director of orchestral activities at Mansfield University in north-central Pennsylvania, believes Franklin composed an unusual five-movement string quartet while living in Paris around 1778. The work calls for three violins and one cello, instead of the usual ensemble of two violins, viola and cello that was standard by the late 18th century. But that's not the strangest aspect: the piece stipulates that all four string instruments retune to different pitches, "creating 16 notes to be played without left-hand fingering, using only the bow," Sarch told the paper."

Technorati tags: Hudson valley theater

No comments:

Community Theater in the Mid Hudson Valley of New York. Information on shows, auditions, and our general adventures onstage, backstage and in the audience.