pno. Duration: 9:00

   by Theodore A. Jander

I. Jack be Nimble

II. Ring Around the Rosies

III. Little Miss Muffett

IV. Little Boy Blue

V. Cold and Raw the North Wind Doth Blow

VI. To Market, to Market

My four-and-a-half-year-old daughter, Ellie, and my nineteen-month-old son, Evan, when he sits long enough, both enjoy listening to me read from their Mother Goose books as well as many other stories. Ellie and Evan have brought me a great deal of compositional inspiration over the past four and a half years. They have opened up a whole new way of perceiving the world, especially music. Hence, the title, As Children Hear. The main theme of these character pieces is that each is based on a literal interpretation derived from the entire text, a portion of the text or from the nursery rhyme’s history.

As Children Hear was premiered February 28, 2009 at the SCI Region VI Conference hosted by the Bass School of Music at Oklahoma City University. The piece was described by a composer at the premiere as “whimsical, yet well balanced with some seriousness.”