Air and Jig
Air and Jig for english horn and viola was written in 2007 in memory of Anthony Simmons, at the request of his widow Marka Kasker-Simmons. It was premiered by Kathleen Foster, viola (New Jersey Symphony), and Lloyd Shorter, english horn (Co-Artistic Director, Relâche), on 20 May 2007 at the Settlement Music School, Mary Louise Curtis Branch, Philadelphia, and 21 May 2007 at First and Central Church, Wilmington, Del.
Air and Jig uses two original tunes that are Celtic-inspired, and they helped me to memorialize the sorrow at the loss of Anthony Gwynn Simmons. The first tune is a lament. I imagined the notes singing a song with this title, but there are no other lyrics, just the title. The second tune is a remembrance of his love of life and humor. We’ll never again see The Likes of Gwynn.
1. I’m Away for the Western Isles (6:21)
2. The Likes of Gwynn (2:28)
Here are the tunes, transposed for violin or other C instrument.
Air, I’m Away for the Western Isles
Alabanza
Text from “Morning Song and Evening Walk” by Sonia Sanchez
(used by permission),
Psalm 147:3,4, and
Psalm 148:13
Tonite in need of you
and God
I move imperfect
through this ancient city.
Quiet. No one hears
No one feels the tears
of multitudes
Alabanza. Alabemos al Señor.
[Praise. Praise the Lord.]
The silence thickens
I have lost the shore
of your kind seasons
who will hear my voice
El sana á los quebrantados de corazón, y liga sus heridas,
El cuenta el nùmero de las estrellas.
[He heals the broken in heart, and binds up their wounds.
He tells the number of the stars.]
Alaben el nombre de Jehová, porque sólo su nombre es elevado;
Su gloria es sobre tierra y cielos.
[Let them praise the name of the Lord, for his name alone is excellent;
his glory is above the earth and heaven.]
Chant
This work for trombone, bassoon, and piano was commissioned by Thomas Elliott, a wonderful Philadelphia trombonist, to perform with his daughter, the gifted bassoonist Rachel Elliott, for her senior recital at Carnegie Mellon University. The music is a setting, if you will, of 1 Corinthians 12:4–6,
Now there are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit. And there are diversities of service, but the same Lord. And there are diversities of operations, but the same God who works all in all.
The music is based on the Greek text, using a system that converts each of the 24 letters of the Greek alphabet into pitches, framing them within shifting overtone series, themselves determined by the letters. For the wind instruments each of the three sections is one of the verses. The piano, however, repeats the first verse throughout. Each letter of each word is represented, although they don’t always follow in strict order. But ultimately this is music inspired from the chant tradition: it moves slowly and simply, often in unison or in octaves. Its musical challenges for the performers demand close communication and listening, to present a unified voice. It suggests unity, diversity, and relationship over immediate virtuosity.
Chorale for Orchestra
The Chorale for Orchestra is inspired specifically by Ambler and its history. The music provides snapshots of different stages of Ambler through the years. Before there was an Ambler or even settlers here, there was the Wissahickon flowing through the area. One can envision the creek filled with fish (Wissahickon means “catfish stream”), and flocks of birds twisting in the sky (so many pigeons congregated in the area that nearby Blue Bell was originally called Pigeontown). Not even any permanent Indian settlements were in the immediate area, so natural a setting it was. The opening of the music depicts this pristine landscape.
William Penn purchased the entire area, and sold one bit of it to William Harmer, who settled here and opened the first grist mill. The grain cracks on the stone wheels driven by the running stream. The percussion comes into play with all its force, and over it a melody spins, reminiscent of the work of 18th-century tunesmiths. This industry drove what is now Ambler for over a century, as more and more farms and mills came to life along the Wissahickon.
Eventually a rail line was laid, which brought tragedy along with progress. The great train wreck of 1856 killed 59 and injured 100, but out of the disaster the townsfolk pulled together to care for the wounded and dying. Unison trumpets alert us to the crash, followed by undulating triads of flutes, strings, woodwinds, and finally the entire orchestra coming together. The rescue effort was led by Mary Ambler, who turned her house into a temporary hospital. Her service was honored by the naming of the town and train station after her.
Here enters the chorale, a hymn on the name “Ambler.” A well used technique of turning letters into pitches is employed. The start of the chorale tune, then, actually spells out Ambler in notes, honoring the history of the borough and the 50th anniversary of the orchestra bearing its name. The work highlights each section of the orchestra, and it is a salute to the community of players and the community at large, all working together.
Poems of Stephen Berg
The rhythm of the words of “Ibycus” were the starting-point for my setting of these two poems. The rhythm, and the self-styled fragmentary nature of the phrasing, suggested to me a setting that would sound improvisatory. Normally I don’t repeat text when setting it to music, but here I felt that it would be in keeping with the character of the poem. Once the beginnings of the vocal line occurred to me, I realized that what I was hearing with it was a progression of 13th chords, not unlike a jazz progression. I decided to stay with that, and I chose the clarinet and piano, together with the voice, as an appropriate instrumentation.
If I had composed “Always” first it would be a different song than it is. As it stands, though, “Ibycus” came first, and the style of that informed the composing of “Always.” It became a slow, inward ballad, instead of an expressionistic cry from the heart, which is what I was hearing when I first read the poem. The weight of the setting, then, shifted from the last line to the seventh, or, from “outloud” to “the simple phrase.”
Commissioned by Network for New Music. Premiere 26 Jan 2001, Martha Elliot, soprano, Arne Running, clarinet, Linda Reichert, piano. Additional performances 12-15 Jan 2002, soprano Latonia Moore, clarinetist Joseph Smith, pianist Richard Raub, Academy of Vocal Arts, Philadelphia.
A Song of Sonia Sanchez
Text by Sonia Sanchez (used by permission)
ayyy
i have cried all night
tears pouring out of my forehead
sluggish in pulse
tears from a spinal soul
that run in silence to my birth
am i born?
i cannot peel the flesh.
i hear the moon daring to dance these rooms.
O to become a star.
stars seek their own mercy and sigh the quiet like gods.
Symphony: Lumen ad revelationem
This work is a meditation on the day of The Presentation of Our Lord, the 2nd of February, a festival of the Church close to the dates of the premiere. Though nothing is sung, the music follows texts associated with the day. For the first movement I was drawn by the beauty of the chant in Latin which is the antiphon repeated throughout the singing of the Gospel in Luke 2, the story of Simeon: “Lumen ad revelationem gentium, et gloriam plebis tuae Israel,” (“A light to lighten the gentiles, and the glory of your people Israel”). For a variety of reasons, not least among them being the events of September 11th, 2001, I decided on a literal “setting” of the entire text in Latin of verses 22-32, using the syllables and accents of the words as well as the punctuation itself, as generators of the musical material.
Continuing with the Latin, verses 3 and 4 of the Psalm for the day, Psalm 84, become the second movement, which can be translated as: “Even the sparrow has found a home, and the swallow a nest for herself where she may lay her young, even thine altars, O Lord of hosts, my King and my God. Blessed are those who dwell in thy house; they will still be praising thee.”
The third movement comprises the remainder of the Psalm, although here the musical setting is of the text in English. The entire text is followed, including a brief percussion solo at the indication of “Selah,” a word which is believed to be a break or a musical instruction of some sort to the original singers of the Psalms. The movement begins with its own antiphon, which is verse 11: “For the Lord God is a sun and shield; the Lord bestows favor and honor; no good thing does he withhold from those whose walk is blameless.”
Three Dances
The melody in the Introduction is the first half of the Lutheran chorale “Eins ist Not, ach Herr, dies Eine.” In the Country Dance, the recurring melody, carried mostly by the lower voices, is a variant on an early American fuguing tune called “Eternal Day.”
The Waltz is actually a passacaglia employing six pitches: D, F#, G, G#, A, C#. Every note in the movement is from this group. Whether the pitches create a scale or give the impression of the outline of a scale is debatable, but the large gaps and the reliance on the tritone abet the feeling of absence and longing.
The beginning of the Fuguing Tune repeats the truncated chorale of the Introduction, leaving the long 6/8 section as the fuguing part. The melody here is a variant of the English carol “A Virgin most Pure.” The second half of the Lutheran chorale appears as the repeating bass line in this movement at, for example, measures 21-25.
Commissioned by the Lehigh Valley Chamber Orchestra, Donald Spieth, Music Director, and premiered March 9, 10, 11, 1995. The string orchestra version was premiered by the Concerto Soloists of Philadelphia November 8, 1998.
The Three Graces
I composed The Three Graces over the chord changes to the chorus of “Wait Till You See Her” by Richard Rodgers. After the introduction and statement of the tune, the soloists take turns on the choruses, first playing two choruses each, then trading off in various ways.
This started out to be a concerto grosso, but a timely immersion into the complete recordings of Miles Davis got me to thinking how like a jazz combo the concerto grosso formula can be. So I decided to try to compose a work of straight jazz (not a piece with jazz elements, which I’ve always found unsatisfying). I grew up listening to my parents’ popular jazz albums, so the sounds of random slices from the 1940s and ’50s—of the Hi-Lo’s (from whom I learned “Wait Till You See Her”); Lambert, Hendricks & Ross; Dave Brubeck; Maynard Ferguson’s A Message from Newport 1958; Billie Holiday; Stan Getz; and of every solo on the 1947 “Star Dust” by Lionel Hampton with the Just Jazz All Stars (especially bassist Slam Stewart’s)—all these sounds inform The Three Graces, which is an homage to them all.
It was my intention for the solos to come across as improvisations. The strings (or piano and bass in the chamber version) take the role of a drummer-less rhythm section, playing what I take to be a mix of swing and early be-bop. I hoped to capture the excitement of something that sounded like it was being made up on the spot, although there is also a great tradition of written-out ensemble jazz.
This is especially an homage to our three daughters, each of the soloists taking on the character of one of the girls. Priscilla, the oldest, was just starting to learn the oboe when I wrote this. Nellie, then six, was the soulful horn. At four, Martina was to be the cellist in this fantasy piece, and cuts in with her first (Slam-inspired) solo before her turn. The two younger girls did not play instruments then, but each later decided to play, in real life, exactly the instrument I assigned to the other one.
Original version for soloists with string orchestra premiered 2,3 Apr 2001 by Gerard Reuter, oboe, Karl Kramer, horn, Wolfram Kössel, cello, and the Jupiter Symphony in New York City, Jens Nygaard conducting. Chamber version (soloists with double bass and piano) premiered 15 Feb 2008 by soloists Priscilla Smith, Patrick Hines, Rajli Bicolli, with Leon Boykins and Jeremy Gill at Rock Hall, Temple University, Philadelphia. Duration, about 11 minutes.
Variations on a Theme of Schubert
The theme is from Schubert’s song “An mein Klavier,” or “To my Piano.” Following the theme are seven variations, each exploiting significant intervals or rhythmic gestures of the song, and each making use of the tune in some way.
Variation 5 also quotes “Beneath the Cross of Jesus,” a favorite hymn of Samuel Hsu’s, the dedicatee of the original version for solo piano. In this variation, the middle register sings the first few notes of that tune, while the left hand assays the Schubert tune in the extreme low register, extremely slowly.
Variation 6 leads into the final variation without a break, and the Schubert tune is treated as a three-part invention, leading into a chorale.
The solo version premiered in 1997. It was revised, and Variation 4 was added, in 1998/99; this orchestration was completed in August 1999, and premiered by the Jupiter Symphony in New York City on September 20th and 21st, 1999, with Makiko Hirata as soloist, Jens Nygaard conducting.
