We are excited to continue our collaboration with the New York Women Composers (NYWC). This month, we present a piece by Beth Anderson.
Beth Anderson. Photo: Molly Sheridan, NewMusicBox.
Bio
Beth Anderson is a composer of neo-romantic music, text-sound works, and music theater events. She has composed an opera, an oratorio, music for orchestra, voice, chorus, tape, instrumental solos with and without electronic modulation, and a large body of chamber music. Her all-Beth Anderson recordings are available on Finders Keepers (I Can’t Stand It, 2024), Other Minds (Namely, 2020), MSR Classics (The Praying Mantis & The Bluebird, 2013), Albany Records (Quilt Music, 2004), New World Records (Swales & Angels, 2004), and Pogus Productions (Peachy Keen-O, 2003).
Born in Kentucky, Anderson studied at Mills College and the University of California at Davis. She has been awarded an Aaron Copland Fund for Music grant and a National Endowment for the Arts grant. Anderson remains active as a composer, with recent premieres of new works in 2024 and 2025.
Featured Work: Trio: Dream in D for violin or flute, cello, and piano
COMPOSITION DETAILS
- Title: Dream
- Composer: Beth Anderson
- Year of Composition: 1980
- Instrumentation: violin or flute, cello, piano
- Movements: 1
- Duration of Work: 9 mins 30 seconds
- Number of Measures: 300
- Number of pages: 30
- Tempo: quarter note equals 116
- Difficulty Level: very accessible – while musically rewarding for a professional with lovely solos, this could even be played by an upper intermediate student as a beautiful introduction to playing trios
- Highest Position Reached: thumb position
- Techniques Employed: “a beautiful legato tone” (noted by Beth Anderson); pizzicato, double stops
- Publisher: Self-published
- Where to Purchase the Score: Contact Beth Anderson
- Cost of Score*: Negotiable price
Recording
Program Notes
“This is a piece that grew out of my work improvising/accompanying modern dance classes. In every class, there was a part that the dancers called “center floor,” where there was usually a beautiful piece of choreography that often included rounded arms, arabesques, slow pliés, and turns on one foot. And I had two friends who wanted me to write a trio that we could play together, so I did. Trio is full of yearning and sometimes a sense of waiting. A friend of mine said it had sections that sounded like two Irishmen lost in Mexico. I don’t know exactly what that means, but it implies a certain folkiness and boisterousness. In the last section, the excitement is created by layering various themes one on top of each other.” – Beth Anderson
Beth Anderson’s Other Compositions with a Prominent Cello Part
- Dr. Blood’s Mermaid Lullaby (1980) for cello and piano
- Eighth Ancestor for violin, flute, cello, and piano; or flute, oboe, cello, and piano; or flute, clarinet, cello, and piano; or baroque flute, alto recorder, cello, and harpsichord
- Pennyroyal Swale Part 1 for string quartet, dedicated to Mr. James Roy
- Jasmine Swale (2005) for string trio, written for the Jade String Trio
A Collaboration with the New York Women Composers (NYWC)
The NYWC series at the Cello Museum was created to showcase its members who have composed various pieces for cello, informing cellists seeking new music to add to their repertoire, and helping listeners find new favorites. Many thanks to the NYWC for this wonderful collaboration.
Read other installments in the series here.
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*Prices are accurate at the time of article publication, but the Cello Museum cannot take responsibility for subsequent price changes.
