Beyond the Notes:
Watercolors
Watercolors (2011) is a piece for wind quintet inspired by the watercolor paintings of Charles Ephraim Burchfield (1893-1967), a brilliant American artist of the first half of the 20th century.
The four movements of Watercolors correspond to four paintings: An April Mood, Autumnal Fantasy, Sun and Rocks, and Glory of Spring (Radiant Spring). Although these works were not created by Burchfield as a series, they have common threads: each is a mystical, semi-abstract vision of a natural environment, and expresses the changing seasons (especially the coming of spring).
Explore the sections below to learn more about Charles Burchfield's work as a whole, these four paintings, and the music they inspired.
Videos on these pages feature Nancy Weekly, Curator and Head of Collections at the Burchfield Penney Art Center, who has written and edited several books on Burchfield including Charles E. Burchfield: The Sacred Woods, and co-curated the recent exhibit Sensory Crossovers: Synesthesia in American Art.
Watercolors was most recently performed by New York City's The Chelsea Quintet on Saturday, November 10, 2012 at the grand public opening of the expanded Parrish Art Museum in Water Mill, New York. Watch a complete video recording of the performance below: