Bartók, Béla: Three Village Scenes (1926) 12'
for four or eight female voices and chamber orchestra

Music Text  
folksongs (E,G,F)

Scoring
1.1.2.sax.1-1.1.1.0-perc-harp-pft-strings

Repertoire Note  
During the years 1923-26 Bartók composed little; indeed he confessed to having become an ‘ex-composer’. In the middle of this fallow period, he produced these settings of Slovak songs about every-day village life, particularly marriage. The selection of three of the songs which he arranged for female voices and chamber orchestra is Bartók’s answer to Stravinsky’s Les Noces, and shows some of his most imaginative orchestral writing.

Note by Malcolm Gillies