Rachael Hutchings

Pianist, Composer

Scores available at Veritas Musica Publishing

Willow Suite
a neo-Baroque suite for solo piano

Willow Suite was inspired by the great keyboard suites of J.S. Bach. In this suite, I used traditional Baroque dance forms, and I combined counterpoint with a free use of modern harmonies and rhythms.

The work was commissioned by Kailey Kaes in 2013. As I began writing the suite, my husband Dan and I celebrated our ninth anniversary, traditionally associated with the willow. A symbol of strength and flexibility, the willow’s sinuous branches seem to evoke interweaving lines in a contrapuntal texture, each moving in their own way while remaining part of a larger whole.

Rachael Hutchings, piano