Music by
DANIEL DORFF
Fast Walk    
Duration: 2'30"

Clarinet version:
COMPOSED for and PREMIERED by Clarinessence, Brandywine River Museum, Chadds Ford, Pa., December 21, 1989.
HEAR & WATCH a performance with Steven Christ (on all parts)
BUY from your favorite sheet music dealer, or direct from Presser.

Saxophone version:
Hundreds of performances by San Francisco Saxophone Quartet and Amherst Saxophone Quartet.
RECORDED by the Harmo Saxophone Quartet on Meister Music CD MM-1016 (Japan) and also the "Harmo's Best" Greatest Hits CD.
NYSSMA list of recommended contest pieces.
HEAR the Harmo Saxophone Quartet's recording.
BUY from your favorite sheet music dealer, or direct from Presser.

Bassoon version:
PREMIERED by the Ohio State University Bassoon Ensemble, Christopher Weait director, at IDRS 1997.
BUY from your favorite sheet music dealer, or direct from Presser.

Orchestra version:
INSTRUMENTATION: 222(Bcl)2 4330 1-2Perc Strings
 PERFORMANCES include the DC Youth Orchestra televised on over 300 PBS-TV stations to an audience over 8,000,000 on the MENC "World's Largest Concert."
Orchestral score and parts are on rental from Presser.

PROGRAM NOTES
FAST WALK was composed in 1989 originally for 3 Bb Clarinets and Bass Clarinet, for the quartet Clarinessence in which I played bass clarinet. The music popped out all at once one day while I was composing my Concerto for Contrabassoon.

Soon after, I made versions for SATB Saxophone Quartet, and for Orchestra, and for 3 Bassoons and Contrabassoon. The orchestra version was broadcast on the 1994 MENC World's Largest Concert to an estimated 8 million viewers, and it was also included in the San Antonio Symphony's 2002-03 season of educational concerts for which they received ASCAP's Adventuresome Programming Award.

The saxophone version has been recorded by the Tokyo-based Harmo Saxophone Quartet and has been performed hundreds of times as an encore by the Amherst Saxophone Quartet and by the San Francisco Saxophone Quartet.

CORRECTION IN SAX QUARTET VERSION
Baritone Saxophone part, bars 40-44 remain in a key signature of 2 sharps.

REVIEWS
"This short, upbeat piece makes a terrific opener for a concert, or as the first piece after intermission."
            –Saxophone Journal (Susan Fancher), September/October 2007

 "Daniel Dorff's 1991 "Fast Walk," followed the Gershwin Lullaby and made a nice antidote to its dreaminess with an animated, chattery and positive ambience."
            – Buffalo (NY) News (Herman Trotter), January 24, 1994



 
last updated May 25, 2026
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