NOTES Dedicated to Dr.
Cort McClaren and the UNCG Percussion Ensemble, Limerick Daydreams was the 2nd Place Winner of the 2005 Percussive Arts Society
International Composition Contest. The 12-minute work scored for 10
percussionists is based on the Irish reel, Highway to Limerick. The work
opens rather mysteriously with fragments of the tune in the keyboard instruments
and echoes of a bodhran (a traditional Irish drum) emulated by a dampened bass
drum. A raucous drumming section ensues and gives way to the first full
presentation of the reel in the xylophone. What follows is a series of melodic,
rhythmic, and harmonic transformations of the Irish tune – some quite playful,
some beautifully melancholy, and some majestically resolute.
. . . . . . . .
SOUND FULL RECORDING (13.7 MB) CLIP ONLY (6.9 MB) University of North Carolina at
Greensboro Percussion Ensemble
VIDEO University of Oklahoma Percussion Orchestra, directed by Lance Drege
REVIEW (excerpt) "In recent years, Nathan Daughtrey has distinguished himself as an accomplished
marimba artist. Now he deserves recognition as an outstanding composer, having
won both second and third place in this year’s contest with Limerick
Daydreams and Adaptation, respectively. Daughtrey’s
compositional style is such that he has the ability to unify a piece around a
small number of melodic and rhythmic ideas that undergo constant variation.
Throughout the remaining sections of the work this folk tune is skillfully
crafted, being set in novel harmonies, sometimes simple and diatonic, sometimes
chromatic and dissonant. Textures are constantly changing, as is the level of
tension. Toward the end of the work the piece becomes extremely complex,
both musically and technically."
