Works for Saxophone Quartet [Stateside]

Founded in 2012 at the Royal College of Music, the Ferio Saxophone Quartet has since developed an exceptionally broad repertoire, allowing the ensemble to draw from a wide range of musical styles and periods in its concert programmes. On its fifth album, the quartet pays tribute to the country in which the saxophone developed a particularly important role: the United States of America.

The programme includes American music from the first half of the 20th century, ranging from Scott Joplin’s “Pine Apple Rag” and Jelly Roll Morton’s “Finger Buster” to George Gershwin’s “An American in Paris” and works by Florence Price, as well as Kurt Weill’s music from “The Threepenny Opera” and Leonard Bernstein’s “West Side Story”. With Rudy Wiedoeft’s “Sax Serene”, the album also features a musician who was himself one of the early virtuosos of the saxophone. The works are performed in arrangements by James Boatman, Christoph Enzel, Iain Farrington, John Harle and Nigel Wood.