Paul McCartney’s - A Leaf

Sir Paul McCartney est né à Liverpool en 1942.
Avec trois amis, il a contribué à changer le monde en chantant l'amour et l'amitié.
A Leaf est une ouvre musicale impressionniste en sept mouvements pour piano composée en 1994.
Interprétée pour la première fois à Londres en 1995 par Anya Alexeyev.

Here's a review which I approached with more than a little trepidation, because the composer is, quite simply, a legend. Yes, it is written by that Paul McCartney. The composer biography given here is a masterpiece of conciseness: «Paul MeCartney was born in Liverpool in 1942. With three friends, he changed the world simply by singing of love and friendship.«
The edition is sixteen pages, of which the first six are introductory material. A Leaf was written for piano, and premiered in London in 1995. It was also fully orchestrated and released on the album Working Classical. The arranger for guitar, Carl Aubut, is a friend of McCartney's, and it was McCartney himself who suggested that it could be adapted for guitar. Aubut worked at it, off and on, for ten years, and completed it at the end of 2008; it was printed the following year.
As to the music itself, it is a substantial seven-movement work with a recorded time of twelve minutes. It starts with a simple waltz-like theme in A major and concludes with a slightly modified version of the same theme as the last movement. All seven movements are connected, with no real breaks anywhere. The piece isn't a formal theme-and-variations, but there is plenty of connected thematic material to tie everything together very neatly. Five of the seven movements can be played by an accomplished amateur, but the third (Allegro ritmico) and fifth (Allegro ma non troppo) require high fluency in mixed scale/slurring technique, on par with the Bach Prelude in E Major, BWV 1006. The intervening fourth movement is gorgeous; it is in C# minor. yet manages not to be a nightmare of barred chords.
If a Barrueco, Vidovic, Russell, or similar «top gun« player were to record this, it would absolutely become a standard repertoire piece.«
David Norton (Soundboard Magazine)


A Leaf was written as a seven-movement piano solo in 1994 by McCartney and has been adapted for guitar by Carl Aubut. The manner, in which he decided to do so, is given in the Preface.
McCartney has written, over the recent years, a number of serious compositions including string quartet material, to full works for orchestra and choir. This solo piano work is really quite substantial and is perhaps not as well known as say his Standing Stones, or his Liverpool Oratorio that received much more wide publicity during their performances. Having not had access to the original piano work, I cannot comment on how successful the adaptation for guitar is but will have to take it on its own merits
It begins very simply with a delicate melody in triple meter against a rocking accompaniment. The second movement is slightly faster and mixes three and four beats to create a slightly uneasy lurching effect. Then an allegro ritmico in B major enters with some swiftly moving accompanying quaver passages leading to a rasgueado section interspersed with semi-quaver runs that in turn changes to a dreaming section that ends inconclusively. The andante that follows is in C sharp minor. After an opening legato chordal idea a brief foray into whole tone takes one for four bars into a Debussyan world after which we find ourselves in C major for a new idea before two enigmatic chords take us back into C sharp minor for the opening idea once more. But this time at the whole tone section we find the opening chordal theme placed over the top of the whole tone harmonies. This in turn becomes the C major idea again, and the coda returns once more to the opening idea for its conclusion. Movement 5 is a 9/8 Allegro ma non troppo running quaver idea. This pleasant enough little idea is then replaced by a rather sparsely harmonized 3/4 section with a naïve set of harmonies that failed to sound anything other than contrived, especially at the last chord that leads back to the opening idea. The two sections then play out again followed by the opening idea once more and a close on an open B. Movement 6 is a moderato little melody, very sad and beautifully worked out that becomes an oddly rocking idea where the accents are constantly shifting and the harmonies are deliberately vague. The rhythms stop and start at odd points leaving one purposely in the air. After an altered return to the opening idea, the oddly rocking section returns, pauses and then becomes the opening first movement theme from several minutes ago. This time it is shorter and only once through the idea before the piece comes to a final close on an A major chord.
Having played this several times now, I feel that it is a bit mixed. There are many sections that work really well and sound absolutely fine, and then there are one or two where one feels McCartney is stretching himself too much and the piece suffers as a result. However as a piece of guitar music it obviously has a future and it is all utterly playable by an intermediate player. Moreover as it is of quite a substantial size I feel that many will be intrigued enough to give it a try. The printing and general presentation is of course excellent as always with d'OZ.
Chris Dumigan (Classical Guitar Magazine)