Terrence Niska
Composer • Arranger
The Icy Breath of Winter
The winds howl, hurling the snow through the air with a vengeance. It is near impossible to see your hand before your face as the storm rages on and the "Icy Breath of Winter" threatens to freeze the very blood in your veins.
This prelude requires the pianist to have a keen understanding of the multiple voices needed to be brought out between the hands. There is a great deal of arpeggio work in the left hand and the quick tempo of the piece demands a strong technique and lightness of touch.
Piano Prelude of the Month
As a member of the vocal trio, The Niskas, I have had the opportunity to write arrangements of some of my favorite Christmas carols and sing them with my brother and his wife. There is no shortage of wonderful songs to choose from, and Silent Night is one of the most beloved carols of all time. In creating this arrangement I was looking to blend the style sensibilities of modern folk and pop music, while at the same time maintaining the simple beauty and meaning of the original. When I first created the instrumental parts, I was envisioning oboe and guitar, but at the suggestion of my dear friend and colleague, Alton Accola, we decided to go with a flugelhorn. Al had already approached Manny Laureano, principal trumpet of the Minnesota Orchestra, who graciously agreed to take part in the recording.
In the late spring/early summer of 2018, I was approached by Alton Accola to write an a cappella arrangement of a Christmas song to close out a Worldwide Holiday Special he was working on to be broadcast on YouTube as a part of his Behind The Mic channel. It was to be hosted by Cheryl Bentyne, of the Manhattan Transfer, and would features vocal groups from 9 countries including Slovenia, the Philippines, Denmark, Sweden, France, England, Brazil, Canada, and the United States.
The final number, Christmas Time Is Here, was performed by 35 of the vocalists with Ms. Bentyne singing the lead. It was produced in a manner similar to the Eric Whiteacre virtual choirs. The vocalists recorded their parts to a click track and then sent them to our mixing engineer, Chris White, who put the audio together. They also recorded a video of their performance which was then sent to our videographer, Michael Swedberg, who created the whole look of the Holiday Special. It was a remarkable experience and one that I thoroughly enjoyed working on from beginning to end.
In early 2019, I began composing on a regular basis and entering various competitions both in the U.S. and abroad. One such competition was the NED Ensemble in Italy, who was asking for submissions in several categories. The one I entered was for Voice and Piano, with nature as the theme. I came across the poem “Autumn,” by Alexander Posey, and was inspired to write a setting for high voice and piano. It was one of the first competitions I had entered and I can’t say what my expectations were, but was pleasantly surprised when I received an email saying that, although I had not won a prize for my piece, it did receive the honor of being an Out Selection. The director of the ensemble, Andrea Mannucci, liked it very much and wanted to include it in a concert with the winners, but asked to do an arrangement of it for clarinet, cello and piano. I was both humbled and thrilled to see his response and granted my permission, asking only to have a recording of the concert and a copy of the program. This is my first, and so far only, attempt at creating a video and uses the recording from the concert. The bucolic sound of the clarinet melding with the warmth of the cello and underpinned by the piano creates a beautiful soundscape which I tried to capture in the video and still photographs.