go for it!

Surendran Reddy was commissioned by the Southern African Music Rights Organisation (SAMRO) to write this piece for the jazz piano finals of their 1993 Overseas Scholarships Competition for pianists. He completed it in December 1992. At the competition it would have been performed with bass and drums, but it is far from being a ‘normal’ jazz piece, for the almost fully written out solo part is virtuoso, and the work can be performed as a solo. There are two improvisatory windows for the soloist.

The recording below is a studio recording played by Surendran Reddy and Andreas Apitz on four (or more) keyboards, playing one with the left hand and the other with the right. They programmed the keyboards to the sounds they wanted (bass, piano/keyboard, drums, solo instrument) and in that way it became a highly virtuoso two-piece ‘band’. They at first called their duo ‘Key 2 Music’ and then later, ‘Campaign for Real Time’ (after Douglas Adams – Life, the Universe and Everything Else), and gave thrilling performances of go for it! between 1997 and 1999, including one at the Frankfurt Musikmesse.

There are several sources for this work, including the SAMRO publication, a proof annotated by Reddy before publication, and a complete handwritten autograph score. This latter is the source chosen for the ACE publication, as it was presumably also the original source for the SAMRO score. Reddy wrote ‘Composer’s Notes for the Performer’ for the SAMRO score that are not available in any other form, and so they are reproduced at the front of the score, by kind permission of SAMRO.