Four Personalities - OB/PN

Four Personalities
for oboe and piano
by Alyssa Morris (b. 1984) - American composer

This title is a four-movement work based on the Hartman personality test.

• Yellow: Yellow is fun-loving. The joy that comes from doing something just for the sake of doing it is what motivates and drives yellow. 
• White; White is  peacekeeper. White is kind, adaptable, and a good listener. Though motivated by peace, white struggles with indecisiveness. 
• Blue: Blue brings great gifts of service, loyalty, sincerity, and thoughtfulness. Intimacy, creating relationships, and having purpose is what motivates and drives blue.
• Red: Motivated by power, red is aggressive and assertive. Red is visionary confident, and proactive. 

Highly creative, tuneful, and inventive writing. The first movement alone, written in a jazzy style, will win you over! A wonderful new addition to the oboe repertoire of the 21st century.

ABOUT THE COMPOSER:

Alyssa Morris has delighted audiences around the world with her “exceptional” and “soulful” musicianship (Fanfare Magazine). Alyssa serves as Assistant Professor of Oboe at Kansas State University and as the principal oboist of the Topeka Symphony Orchestra and Wichita Grand Opera.  She has appeared as a soloist in venues throughout the United States, Scandinavia, the British Isles, and Western Europe.  Alyssa has previously held the position of Associate Principal Oboe in the Richmond (IN) Symphony Orchestra, and second oboe in the Utah Wind Symphony.  Her recent CD album release via MSR Classics, “A Higher Place,” has been hailed by American Record Guide as “gorgeous and thoughtful” with “stunning” performances, “unmistakable…virtuosity” and “deft emotional timing.” 

Regarding her equally expansive work as a composer, the American Record Guide writes that Dr. Morris’s music “has charm, piquancy, verve, and most importantly, substance.” Her chamber music is performed extensively around the world, and has been presented at the national and international conventions of IDRS, ICA, NFA, and SCI.  Dr. Morris is an International Barlow Composition Commission Award Winner.  She has additionally been commissioned to write music for the River Oaks Chamber Orchestra, the Richmond Symphony Orchestra, the U.S. Air Force Woodwind Quintet, and Carolyn Hove (principal English horn of the Los Angeles Philharmonic) to name a few. Dr. Morris’s music has been recorded on the Equilibrium, Centaur, and MSR Classics labels.

Dr. Morris earned her BM and MM degrees at Brigham Young University, where she studied with Dr. Geralyn Giovannetti. She earned her DMA at the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music where she studied with Dr. Mark Ostoich. 

For more information, please visit the composer's website at: http://www.alyssamorrismusic.com/