Vespers uses Renaissance instruments; The Waking Sun and The Nobility of Women, Baroque. Some people have asked how do I do it, and why. We composers rarely ask ourselves “why” questions, but fair enough.…
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Category Archives: New Compositions
The Nobility of Women, Chestnut Hill Local
Referring to Vespers and saying that I have made a name from “composing new music for older instruments,” Michael Caruso in the Chestnut Hill Local calls The Nobility of Women “concisely pointed character sketches of baroque dances.”
I can’t deny that I’ve become known as someone who can write for historical instruments. Mélomanie approached me about a piece for them—which became Nobility—after they heard Vespers. The Crossing and the Baroque orchestra Tempesta di Mare talked to me about The Waking Sun after Vespers.
People sometimes ask me if I mind. I suppose McLean Stevenson was asked if he minded being Lt. Col. Henry Blake on M*A*S*H. I don’t mind. I love it. If people think that’s what I do, fine, as I love writing for all kinds of instruments, and love the challenge of releasing the gorgeous sounds of recorders, dulcians, gambas, or what have you.
But I don’t think of myself that way. I’ve composed choral music, lots of orchestral works, and songs and chamber music for decades. I’m working on many different projects now, none of which use “early” instruments. If I go back to it, I’d be delighted, though.
Caruso had nice things to say, including that “Melomanie gave The Nobility of Women a sterling reading.”
The Nobility of Women, Philadelphia Inquirer
The “kind of musical layering that makes his choral works so entrancing” spoke to the Philadelphia Inquirer’s David Patrick Stearns in his review of The Nobility of Women, my premiere with Mélomanie this past weekend. It’s a dance suite for Baroque flute, oboe, violin, cello, and viola da gamba and harpsichord, and is about 20 minutes long in eight dances.
He said that the piece hit its stride when “a big, interesting harpsichord flourish invaded the third movement,” and continued to say that the “Sarabande had an oboe solo full of eloquent, Italianate longing, while the final-movement Ciaccona was packed with individual star turns.” He relates Nobility to the line of “works as diverse as Stravinsky’s Agon and Respighi’s popular Ancient Arts and Dances.“
There were small and not-so-small solos throughout the piece. Daughter Priscilla (the oboist) played beautifully in that Sarabande solo, as did everyone, who weaved the lovely sounds of these instruments into the ensemble. Stearns rightly singled out “the poised soulfulness of Boismortier’s Suite in D minor, played with particular depth by the wonderful viola da gamba player Donna Fournier.”
I liked the Telemann more than he did, but I realize that I may be in the minority. Telemann just doesn’t miss with me, the Dvorak of the Baroque. But lots of people, I’ve found, think of Telemann’s output as they do of much of Hindemith’s. And I can’t say I’ve ever been bored by Hindemith, either. Even the notey stuff I love.
Mark Hagerty’s clever and delightful Variations on a Theme by Steely Dan rounded out the concert, along with Couperin dances for Priscilla.
I had a blast writing for this wonderful group. Their commitment to the piece revealed little explosions of surprise that captivated me.
Vespers preview in the Weekly Press
The Vespers performances by Piffaro and The Crossing gets a mention by John Lane in the Weekly Press, “Philadelphia’s Community Newspaper,” with particular emphasis on the pre-concert lectures. Donald Nally and I will discuss the work 45 minutes before each concert, so that’s 7:15 for the 8pm Saturday 1/7 concert at Old St. Joseph’s, 3:15 for the 4pm Sunday 1/8 concert at the Presbyterian Church of Chestnut Hill. The New York City concert doesn’t make this paper, but that’ll be a 6:45 talk before the 7:30 Monday 1/9 concert at Park Ave. Christian Church, NYC.
50,000
The website passed 50,000 hits a few weeks ago. Researching the significance of 50,000, I discover from Wikipedia that it is the number between 49,999 and 50,001. Deciding to end my fact-finding there, I’ll report, then, that it seems like a lot, all things considered. It very well may not be. I have little idea what things, in fact, ought to be considered, so I’ll leave it there.
Since I finished two big composing deadlines and am about to start on another, I thought it was time to brush up the site. I changed templates to a cleaner, simpler one. It’s so clean, in fact, that it eliminates the sidebar on all but the homepage, yikes. So I beefed up the every-page top menu, hoping to make it easier to find music, writings, other things.
Nellie and Martina wanted me to keep the picture of the guy carrying the log, so it’s still there in the header, in rotation with shots of me looking at you or not looking at you.
Now on to ASCAP reporting (months in abeyance) and database updating for Now is the Time.
The Waking Sun, 6. While on such beauty the lover gazes
6. While on such beauty the lover gazes
While on such beauty the lover gazes, her cheeks suddenly glow with rosy blush. Snowy wool turns crimson thus when bathed in purple flood; so gleams the waking sun when the shepherd, wet with the dew of the dawn of the day, considers it. —Medea
The Waking Sun centers on D, the individual sections being in these modes: 1. B minor — 2. D Dorian — 3. D minor — 4. A Mixolydian — 5. B minor — 6. D Lydian. I’ve never bothered so much with key relationships, but look for modal color appropriate to the purpose at hand. The old church modes usually provide enough variety and stability to please me, so these are what I use in most of my music.
While the text of “A king is he” would make a fine summation, it started to ring hollow as the ending for this work, especially as it appealed so un-stoically to my own ego. “While on such beauty” argues for the other side of desire, not for the elimination of it.
But what really convinced me was recently seeing a performance of the final duet of Monteverdi’s The Coronation of Poppea. Soft and haunting, “Pur ti miro” (I gaze at you, I possess you) is utterly mesmerizing with its simple four-note ground bass and sweet, biting counterpoint. It is even more remarkable as the ending of an entire opera. That Seneca plays such an important role in Poppea was another connection.
All the instruments but the theorbo are silent for the finale of The Waking Sun, so when the theorbo drops out, the choir is unaccompanied for about the last five minutes of the piece. The ostinato continues in a bass voice, and the choir eventually divides into twelve parts. Each voice repeats its own short phrase, leaves, then re-enters, repeating the words of the title.
18 Jun 2011. The Waking Sun. The Crossing, Tempesta di Mare. Presbyterian Church of Chestnut Hill, Philadelphia, 8 pm
The Waking Sun, 5. A king is he
5. A king is he
A king is he who has no fear; a king is he who naught desires. Such kingdom on himself each man bestows. —Thyestes
If you can have a fuguing tune without the fuguing part, “A king is he” is that piece. I started to write the imitative section that should follow the homophonic opening, but was dissatisfied with every idea. So I repeated the opening, with minor variations in the voices, and peeled away the accompaniment.
I put in most every “wrong” voice-leading I could think of: doubled major thirds, tripled octaves, directisms, parallelisms, and clashes of various sorts. This was to show, I suppose, how fearless, as a king, I was.
The plan was that “A king is he” would be the last section, with “In whose kingdom shall you die?” appended at the end. But it more and more started to sound like a sermon. Now, sermons have their place; I gladly hear one every week. But I don’t think they have a place in music. One could set a sermon to music, but it would cease to be reasoned discourse. Similarly, music attempting to put forward a position ceases to be music.
In any case, the next section grew in importance as an entry into the most appealing aspect, to me, of Seneca’s thought.
18 Jun 2011. The Waking Sun. The Crossing, Tempesta di Mare. Presbyterian Church of Chestnut Hill, Philadelphia, 8 pm
