Tempest Fantasy


Tempest Fantasy is a 2003 chamber music composition in five movements for cello, clarinet, violin, and piano by the American composer Paul Moravec. The piece is dedicated to clarinetist David Krakauer and the piano trio Trio Solisti, who premiered the work May 2, 2003 at Morgan [Library & Museum] in New [York City]. The title of the work comes from the play The Tempest by William Shakespeare. The work won the 2004 Pulitzer Prize for Music.

Composition

Structure

Tempest Fantasy has a duration of approximately thirty minutes and is composed in five movements:
  1. Ariel
  2. Prospero
  3. Caliban
  4. Sweet Airs
  5. Fantasia

    Style and inspiration

Moravec commented on the composition in the program notes for the work, saying:
Moravec has also suggested that the piece was an allegory for his own struggle with depression, commenting: "Coming back from depression, I identified with Prospero and his melancholy and his downcast state. Through the power of imagination he improves his condition, and so that’s what I did as a composer."