Telemann 12 Fantasias for Solo Flute (Conor Nelson)

Praised for his “long-breathed phrases and luscious tone” by the Minneapolis Star Tribune, Canadian flutist Conor Nelson presents a new recording of Telemann’s 12 Fantasias for Solo Flute, a glorious mélange of genres and styles, inviting performers and listeners to myriad interpretational challenges and delights.
For Dr. Nelson, the flute professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, his experience with new music was an additional lens creatively for his hypotheses with respect to interpretation. The process of creating a personalized vision –as if one had never heard a piece– was not a foreign process. Here, improvisation was a central part of this creative venture, using an intermix of stylistic advice to widen the palate for expression, all with the expressive goal of imbuing the performance with fantasy.  This improvisatory path intersects with mood and character a great deal and often results in playing things differently every time, even in the recording studio.  Can one capture the intentionality of a fantasy if it is entirely planned and executed the same every time?