20th century
Baroque
Classical
Romantic
20th century
21st century
Solo repertoire
Piccolo
Alto flute
Bass flute
Colgrass Michael
Aitken, Robert
Amirov, Fikret
Amlin, Martin
Amram, David
Andriessen, Jurriaan
Arnold, Malcolm
Arrieu, Claude
Auric, Georges
Babbit, Milton
Bacchus, Peter
Bacri, Nicolas
Baker, Michael Conway
Baksa, Robert
Barber, Samuel
Barrere, Georges
Bartók, Béla Viktor János
Baton, René-Emmanuel
Beaser, Robert
Bennet, Richard Rodney
Berg, Gunnar
Berio, Luciano
Bernofsky, Lauren
Bernstein, Leonard
Bloch, Ernest
Bolling, Claude
Bon, Maarten
Bonis, Mel
Boughton, Rutland
Boulanger, Marie-Juliette
Boulez, Pierre
Bourdin, Roger
Bournonville, Armand
Bowen, Edwin York
Bozza, Eugène Joseph
Bréville, Pierre
Brings, Allen
Brotons, Salvador
Brown, Elizabeth
Brun, Georges
Burkhard, Willy
Burton, Eldin
Büsser, Henri
Camus, Pierre
Carmichael, John
Carter, Elliott
Casella, Alfredo
Chaynes, Charles
Clarke, Ian
Colgrass, Michael
Colquhoun, Michael
Copland, Aaron
Corigliano, John
Cortese, Luigi
Currier, Sebastian
Dahl, Walter Ingolf Marcus
Damase, Jean-Michel
Davidovsky, Mario
De Lorenzo, Leonardo
Debussy, Claude
Del Tredici, David
DeLaney, Charles Oliver
Delerue, Georges
Denisov, Edison
Dèsbriere, Jacques
Dick, Robert
Dinicu, Grigoraș
Dodgson, Stephen
Dohnányi, Ernő
Dubois, Pierre Max
Dukas, Paul
Durey, Louis
Dutilleux, Henri
Enescu, George
Farkas, Ferenc
Feld, Jindřich
Ferroud, Pierre-Octave
Flothuis, Marius
Folio, Cynthia
Foote, Arthur
Foss, Lukas
Françaix, Jean
Fukushima, Kazuo
Gade, Jacob
Gál, Hans
Gaubert, Philippe
Genzmer, Harald
George, Thom Ritter
Ghidoni, Armando
Gieseking, Walter
Glass, Philip
Glière, Reinhold
Golovin, Andrei
Gordeli, Otar
Grier, Lita
Griffes, Charles Tomlinson
Grinblat, Romuald
Grovlez, Gabriel
Guarnieri, Mozart Camargo
Gubajdulina, Sofia
Hahn, Reynaldo
Hailstork, Adolphus
Halphen, Fernand
Hanson, Howard Harold
Harberg, Amanda
Harbison, John
Harsányi, Tibor
Harty, Hamilton
Heiss, John
Heith, David
Henze, Hans-Werner
Higdon, Jennifer
Hindemith, Paul
Holliger, Heinz
Holmboe, Vagn
Honegger, Arthur
Hoover, Katherine
Hosokawa, Toshio
Hovhaness, Alan
Hüe, Georges Adolphe
Hurel, Philippe
Ibert, Jacques
Ichiyanagi, Toshi
Ittzés, Gergely
Ives, Charles
Jacob, Gordon
James, Bob
Jemnitz, Sándor
Jirák, Karel Boleslav
Jóhannsson, Magnús Blöndal
Jolivet, André
Jongen, Joseph
Karg-Elert, Sigfrid
Kay, Ulysses
Kelterborn, Rudolf
Ķeniņš, Tālivaldis
Kennan, Kent Wheeler
Kennedy, Martin
Kernis, Aaron Jay
Khachaturian, Aram
Kocsár, Miklós
Kodaly, Zoltan
Koechlin, Charles
Kornauth, Egon
Kraft, Leo
Krzywicki, Jan
Kupferman, Meyer
La Montaine, John
Lauber, Joseph
Lavista, Mario
Lee, Eugene
Leeuwen, Ary van
Levinson, Gerald
Liebermann, Lowell
Loudova, Ivana
Mack, Dieter
Mahler, Gustav
Maresz, Yan
Martin, Frank
Martino, Donald
Martinů, Bohuslav
Meltzer, Harold
Messiaen, Olivier
Mihalovici, Marcel
Milhaud, Darius
Mouquet, Jules
Mower, Mike
Muczynski, Robert
Nielsen, Carl
Norby, Erik
Nordenstrom, Gladys
Offermans, Wil
Olsen, Carl Gustav Sparre
Paget, Daniel
Perle, George
Petrovics, Emil
Piazzolla, Astor
Piston, Walter
Poulenc, Francis
Prokofiev, Sergey
Rachmaninoff, Sergei
Ran, Shulamit
Raphael, Günter
Rautavaara, Einojuhani
Ravel, Maurice
Reynolds, Verne
Riegger, Wallingford
Rivier, Jean
Rodrigo, Joaquin
Rota, Nino
Rotaru, Doina
Rouse, Christopher
Roussel, Albert
Rutter, John
Saariaho, Kaija
Sancan, Pierre
Schmidt, Ole
Schocker, Gary
Schulhoff, Erwin
Schwantner, Joseph
Sciarrino, Salvatore
Shostakovich, Dmitri
Sibelius, Jean
Smit, Leo
Tailleferre, Germaine
Takemitsu, Tōru
Taktakishvili, Otar
Tansman, Alexandre
Tomasi, Henri
Tower, Joan
Uébayashi, Yuko
Varèse, Edgar
Vasks, Pēteris
Weigl, Vally
Weinberg, Mieczysław
Wilder, Alec
Williams, Ralph Vaughan
Yi, Chen
Yun, Isang
Zgraja, Krystof
"Wild Riot of the Shaman's Dreams" for flute alone
"Wild Riot of the Shaman's Dreams" for flute alone
Michael Colgrass: "Wild Riot of the Shaman's Dreams" for flute alone was written in 1992. The piece is dedicated to flutist Marina Piccinini, whose playing inspired Colgrass to write for the instrument.
Colgrass was captivated by the "Ihalmiut" people described in Farley Mowat’s People of the Deer. He focuses on the shaman Kakumee, who, through a series of tragic events, becomes a social outcast. The piece depicts the shaman’s internal disintegration. As he wanders alone through the Arctic barrens, he experiences a "wild riot" of hallucinations - reliving past hunts, tribal conflicts, and spirit encounters. Colgrass specifically chose the flute to challenge its "silver and sweet" stereotype. He wanted to turn it into an "Arctic monster," forcing the performer to produce sounds that are guttural, jagged, and terrifying.
The composer notes that the piece ends with the shaman’s physical and mental exhaustion. The final bars represent his "last breath" as he collapses in the snow, bringing the "riot" to a silent end.
To portray this "Arctic monster," (as Dr. Alicia McQuerrey describes the piece as "theatrical monologue), Colgrass requires the flutist to use a vast array of nontraditional techniques, including pitch bending, flutter-tonguing, whistle tones, growling, muttering, singing while playing, and a final "death rattle": a precise rhythmic instruction to mimic the sound of a failing body.
In 1992, Michael Colgrass was deeply influenced by the imagery and environment of the Arctic, a theme that dominated his creative output during this period. The flute solo was composed shortly after his major work for organ and orchestra, Snow Walker (1990), and his wind ensemble work, Arctic Dreams (1991). Colgrass had physically traveled to the Arctic to live with an Inuit family, an experience that profoundly shaped his musical language at the time.
Live performance on October 12, 2016 at Koerner Hall, Toronto, Canada
Wild Riot of the Shaman's Dreams
Colgrass Michael
Michael Colgrass (1932–2019) was a Pulitzer Prize-winning American-Canadian composer, percussionist, and educator known for a style that fused jazz, classical, and theatrical elements.
Born in Chicago, Illinois, Colgrass began his musical journey as a jazz drummer. By age 12, he had organized his own jazz band, the "Three Sharps and a Flat," performing in local Chicago venues.
He attended the University of Illinois, where he studied percussion with Paul Price and composition with Eugene Weigel.
After serving as a timpanist in the Seventh Army Symphony Orchestra in Germany, he moved to New York City. There, he became a top-tier freelance percussionist, performing with the New York Philharmonic, Dizzy Gillespie, and the original West Side Story orchestra under Leonard Bernstein.
Additionally, he studied composition privately with Lukas Foss, Darius Milhaud, Wallingford Riegger, and Ben Weber.
His music is noted for its lyrical modernism and virtuosic use of percussion. His most famous work, Déjà Vu, won the 1978 Pulitzer Prize in Music, specifically commissioned by the New York Philharmonic to highlight the percussion section as soloists.
Later in his career, Colgrass became a pioneer in using Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) to help performers overcome stage fright and enhance creativity. This psychological depth is evident in his narrative works, like Wild Riot of the Shaman's Dreams.
In 1974, Colgrass moved to Toronto, becoming a central figure in the Canadian music scene.
Michael Colgrass primarily treated the flute as a
theatrical and narrative vehicle, often using it to portray psychological or atmospheric states. Among his most notable compositions for flute: "Wild Riot of the Shaman's Dreams" (1992) for solo flute; "A Moment's Liberty" (1995) for flute and piano; "The Schubert Birds" (1989) for flute, harp, and string orchestra (or quintet).