21st century
Baroque
Classical
Romantic
20th century
21st century
Solo repertoire
Piccolo
Alto flute
Bass flute
Ran Shulamit
Adler, Samuel
Albert, Adrienne
Amlin, Martin
Arnauts, Dimitri
Bacri, Nicolas
Baksa, Robert
Balter, Marcos
Beal, Jeff
Bilotta, John
Borisova-Ollas, Victoria
Bullard, Janice Maille
Bunch, Kenji
Carter, Elliott
Chamberlain, Nicole
Chyrzynski, Marcel
Clarke, Ian
Coleman, Valerie
Connesson, Guillaume
Costa Roldán, Eduardo
Cueto, Daniel
Dalbavie, Marc-André
Daugherty, Michael
Dehnhard, Tilmann
Desenne, Paul
Dorff, Daniel
Egger, Fabian Johannes
Eggert, Kenneth
Firšt, Nenad
Furrer, Beat
Garrop, Stacy
Ghidoni, Armando
Gibb, Charles
Hailstork, Adolphus
Harberg, Amanda
Hersh, Howard
Hoover, Katherine
Igudesman, Aleksey
Ittzés, Gergely
Kernis, Aaron Jay
Khoury, Houstaf
Kukal, Ondřej
León, Tania
Lias, Stephen
Liebermann, Lowell
Lindberg, Christian
Linthicum-Blackhorse, William
Louke, Phyllis Avidan
Magalif, Eugene
Mitchell, Jonathan
Monroe, Ervin
Mower, Mike
Mucha, Geraldine
Mulleman, Tim
Ornstein, Maarten
Pann, Carter
Panufnik, Roxanna
Pärt, Arvo
Pattillo, Greg
Penman, Katrina
Petrič, Ivo
Price, William
Pritsker, Gene
Pucihar, Blaž
Ran, Shulamit
Rea, Stephanie
Rotaru, Doina
Rozman, Anže
Schocker, Gary
Schwantner, Joseph
Sciarrino, Salvatore
Seif, Sami
Serebrier, José
Skipworth, Lachlan
Sollberger, Harvey
Somma, Victor
Uébayashi, Yuko
Vasks, Pēteris
Widmann, Jörg
Witt, Carl
Woolf, Randall
Yi, Chen
Birds Of Paradise for flute and piano
Birds Of Paradise for flute and piano
Shulamit Ran: Birds Of Paradise for flute and piano was written in 2014. The piece was commissioned by the Chicago Flute Club to celebrate its 25th anniversary.
The composition consists of three continuous sections (Fast-Slow-Fast). According to Shulamit Ran, the piece was born from a specific mental image of a "fantastical bird of many bright and amazing colors". Ran explicitly stated in her program notes that she did not set out to write a "bird piece" in the literal sense (referencing Olivier Messiaen's ornithological works), but the title emerged because the music's shifting motion and brilliant colors evoked that specific imagery in her mind.
The composition is actually an exploration of the flute's "soul", using a variety of extended techniques: tongue rams, key clicks, and whistle tones.
At the time of composition (2014), Shulamit Ran was serving as the Andrew MacLeish Distinguished Service Professor at the University of Chicago. Ran had spent much of the previous decade working on large-scale orchestral and vocal commissions. Birds of Paradise marked a return to intimate chamber music, specifically exploring the "soul" of the flute, which she had long admired.
Carter Pann (piano), 2019, Innova / Naxos
2. With Mystery and Awe, Slow and Flexible
Ran Shulamit
Shulamit Ran (1949) is an Israeli-American composer who has received many musical awards (Pulitzer Prize, Guggenheim Foundation fellowships etc.). Born in Israel, she moved to New York at the age of 14 to study music at the Mannes College of Music where she studied composition with Norman Dello Joio and Ralph Shapey. She joined faculty of University in Chicago in 1973 where she taught composition until 2015. Her musical style has been described as "dissonant musical universe to create impassioned, personal statements" by music critics.
Among her most notable works: Symphony (1990) for orchestra; Legends (1993) for orchestra; Vessels of Courage and Hope (1998) for orchestra; etc. Other compositions for flute: Sonatine for Two Flutes (1961) and Birds of Paradise for flute and piano (2014).