Brian Patrick Keenan • Heartland

The music of Brian Patrick Keenan—introspective, melodic, and texturally firmly-built—has always appealed to me. His 2003 piano piece Heartland is a tango in simple ternary form in the luminous key of D major. When listening to Heartland, I can’t help but recall pieces by Scott Kirby and George Winston which are similarly evocative of the landscape of the Great Plains. The central section in B minor is movingly bittersweet; the climactic return of the opening section bursts with sunshine. The score for Heartland (excerpt pictured) can be obtained by e-mailing the composer at briankeenanpiano@gmail.com. The piece can heard on Keenan’s SoundCloud page. Oleg Mezjuev has an idyllic video montage incorporating the music of Heartland posted on YouTube.