Blues for Gilbert – Mark Glentworth

Blues for Gilbert was written in the 1960 by Mark Glentworth. It is a

piece for vibraphone, played with four mallets. The most well – known
performances of the piece are the ones by Denis Petrunin, Brad Meyer
and Peter Sadlo. The performances I’m going to talk about are
Petrunin’s and Sadlo’s. The first performer is famous for solo
repertoire, especially for marimba and vibraphone while the second
one, Sadlo, is very popular for multi – percussion and music ensambles
(on tuned percussion) as well as solo repertoire particularly on
marimba. Despite both performers belong to the same music era,
contemporary, the recordings were made in different period of times:
the first one is recent, in fact Petrunin performed his version of Blues
for Gilbert in 2016. Sadlo did his recording earlier on in 2011. The
instruments used in the recordings are different types of vibraphone.
Petrunin performed Blues for Gilbert on a Musser Vibraphone Silver
edition and Sadlo performed it on a Yamaha Silver edition. Performer 1
and performer 2 both play with Stevens technique (different from the
other ones because of mallets held in a specific way, therefore different
type of sound). The reasons why I chose these two recording are very
specific: Sadlo is a world – wide famous percussionist and one of the
best, so it would have been difficult not to choose his version of Blues
for Gilbert. The other reason is because Petrunin is the artist that
inspired me to play this piece and not only; when I first started to study
it, I relied on his interpretation and his phrasing.
The tempo of the recordings varies a lot and the two recordings are
different from each other: the very first chord and the following two
notes are slower in the first recording (Petrunin’s) whilst Sadlo plays
them with more direction and therefore slightly faster. After the triplet
ornamentation at bar 2, the second performer changes the pedal and

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plays the following chord after a small fraction of time. The first
performer plays the whole phrase faster and with more direction while
Sadlo breaths widely and takes more time in this section. The first three
notes at bar 3 are played slower by the second performer whilst
Petrunin plays them with a lot of sense of direction towards the
following F minor chord. The concept of bar 4 and 5 is thought in two
different ways by the two performers: Petrunin takes a lot of space and
separates the phrase with an overall slower time. Sadlo has a very
different idea, playing the two bars with a very interesting sense of
fluency and thinking about them as a whole phrase; in this context,
Sadlo is clearer because he gives to the listener a very touching sense of
tragedy, relevant with the story of the piece. At bar 7, the first
performer plays the diminished 7th arpeggio at a similar speed to the
second one but the difference is that in the first performance there isn’t
much accelerando but just crescendo while in the second extract we
can find both accelerando and crescendo. Another big difference in
tempo is in bar 10, on the quaver triplet. Petrunin plays is very quietly
and smoothly and therefore it sounds faster while Sadlo plays it as a
peak moment so it slows down before playing the top E flat. At bar 16 –
when the strong swing starts – the first performer executes all the
middle section slightly slower than the second performer. The notes
with the pause – at bar 48 – are played with more passion by the
second performer and they are much slower. The first performer plays
them with more intensity and they are faster. At bar 51, the second
performer again gives to the listener a sense of darkness and
depression with the very slow run that ends on another diminished 7th
chord. The one that Petrunin plays is very straight forward (played at a
steady time). The last three notes of bar 63 are played with more
passion by the second performer and therefore they are slower. The
last bar – bar 71 – is played much slower by the first performer who
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gives to the listener a very weeping feeling. The second performer plays
the last bar faster giving the aspect of still being in a swing and jazz
feeling.
The first dynamic difference we can find is at bar 3, where the second
performer puts a little accent on the first note of the bar (the C). At bar
4, there are two different types of crescendo: the one played by the
second performer is a strong and majestic crescendo while the one
played by the first performer is a dramatic crescendo. As a result of this,
the listener can notice that the crescendo interpreted by the second
performer is louder and the one played by the first performer is
quieter. The same event happens again at bar 7. At bar 10, on the
quaver triplet that finishes on the E flat, performer A (first performer)
doesn’t do much of a crescendo while performer B plays a wide and a
big crescendo. There is another difference between the crescendo
before the ‘strong swing’ – at bar 15 – interpreted in two different
ways. The one played by performer A starts already at a mf dynamic so
it is not a very deep crescendo. Performer B starts softer and therefore
it is a more entertaining crescendo. There is a diminuendo starting at
bar 31 until bar 33 where from a forte (f) it will then end on a piano (p).
Neither performer A nor performer B plays soft at bar 33, in fact they
don’t execute a significantly long and wide diminuendo. Therefore they
both end up playing a mp dynamic at bar 33. At bar 38 performer B
plays the forte as a mp/mf to give a sense of surprise, astonishment.
There is a slight difference of interpretation at bar 35; performer A
plays the first note of the subito piano almost silent, as if a person was
out of breath and it really fits the scene. There is a crescendo at the
very end of bar 36 and both performer A and performer B play a
crescendo throughout bar 35 and 36 to create more intensity and to
give the piece more tension. At bar 43 there is a poco a poco
diminuendo which is interpreted as written by performer B. Performer
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 Blues for Gilbert – Mark Glentworth
A does not diminuendo and plays the following 5 bars at the same
dynamic, but then he plays the pp which in contrast with the previous
mf dynamic recreates a surprise effect, unexpected. At the pp of bar 61,
performer B plays it as written, very softly as a pianissimo. Performer A
plays slightly louder to valorize the dramatic moment of the piece. At
bar 71 there is a ppp roll and it is played with two different techniques:
performer A hits the four notes all together to make them vibrate for a
long time and then keeps rolling with the left hand. Performer B plays
the roll as written, without any changes.
In general, the approach at ornamentations given by the two
performers is not very different, but there are some points where the
listener can find some differences. As an overview, performer B tends
to separate the triplets ornamentation from the following note and
performer A tends to evaluate and accentuate the presence of the
acciaccatura when it is written. With very little difference though, the
acciaccatura is shorter when played by performer A. A valid example
we can find is at bat bar 7, on the ascending run forming a diminished
chord; performer A’s acciaccatura is longer and less audible while
performer B’s is shorter and more accentuated. At bar 8, performer B
treats the demi – semi quaver as an ornamentation and he plays it very
fast. At bar 13, performer A does not play the acciaccatura while
performer B does as written. At bar 25, the triplet ornamentation is
played slower and loose by performer A while performer B plays the
ornamentation faster and very accurate. Performer B – at bar 30 – plays
the upbeat of the second beat of the bar as an ornamentation, that is
the reason why it sounds very fast. And again, it is very noticeable the
difference in speed of the acciaccatura at bar 48; clearly faster the one
played by performer B and slower the one played by performer A. At
bar 53, the performer A plays the second triplet group as an
acciaccatura and as an echo of the first group of triplets. An interesting
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feature is the acciaccatura played by performer A at bar 56; if you pay
attention, you will notice that it is played louder than the real notes. At
bar 61, performer A plays the acciaccatura at the beginning of the
phrase as real notes, therefore slower than it should be played. At bar
62, performer A executes the upbeat and the downbeat of the third
beat as an acciaccatura too, very fast and neat. Performer B plays an
acciaccatura at bar 67 even it is not written.
Another very important aspect to talk about is the pedaling of the
vibraphone, the dampening (the technique on which you stop a note
that’s playing or still vibrating and it is indicated with the sign ‘x’) and
the choice of mallets the two performers have made. Petrunin chose to
play ‘Blues for Gilbert’ with soft mallets. The

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