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10.22.2002
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to Are You Brave ?
Festival
V.5.0
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October 22, 2002
Tuesday
8 pm concert
ONE
Andrew Mead
Let the Air Circulate
Jennifer Goltz, voice
Schulamit Ran
East wind
Emily Perryman, flute
Mark Kilstofte
You (Unfolding)
Katri Ervamaa, cello
Joan Towers
Wild Purple
Tim Christie, viola
Grazyna Bacewicz
Sonatina per violino solo
Maria Sampen, violin
Elliot Carter
90+
Winston Choi, piano
Christian Wolff
Eleven Preludes for Piano
Winston Choi, piano
Admission $25 rows 1-2, $15 rows 3-5, $10 general
and $5 for students
Program Notes
Andrew Mead
Let the Air Circulate
In many of her poems, Amy Clampitt wrote about a part of the coast of
Maine that coincidentally I know intimately, both from the shore and from
having spent many summers cruising its waters on my dad's sailboats.
'Tit Manan light is a lighthouse some miles offshore on a small rocky island
that can be seen from a considerable distance in all directions.
-- Andrew Mead
Andrew Mead, Chair of the Music Theory Department, earned his Ph.D.
from Princeton University. He has published analytical and theoretical articles
on music of the twentieth century in Music Theory Spectrum, Perspectives of
New Music, The Journal of Music Theory and elsewhere. His book, An Introduction
to the Music of Milton Babbitt, is published by Princeton University Press.
He is a recipient of the Young Scholar Publications Award from the Society
of Music Theory, and has received the Goddard Lieberson Fellowship from the
American Institute/Academy of Arts and Letters. Recent compositions include
concertos for alto saxophone and cello, as well as works for various chamber
ensembles.
East Wind by Shulamit Ran
East Wind was commissioned by the National Flute Association in 1987 for
its annual Young Artists Competition and was first performed by the six semi-finalists
at the 1988 San Diego NFA Convention. The composer dedicated the work to
the memory of Karen Monson, a writer, critic, and friend, who died in February
1988 at the age of 42. It may or may not have been Ran's intention to embody
a biblical force when she composed this piece, but one cannot deny the connection
to the east wind as found in many scripture passages of the bible. It is
the fiercest of all winds, the one in Exodus that brought the eighth plague
of locusts and was powerful enough to part the Red Sea for Moses and his
people. Ran's East Wind is also remarkably ferocious (and certainly uncharacteristic
of the flute), but it is the so-called "calm after the storm" that the composer
describes as East Wind's central image: "from within its ornamented, inflected,
winding, twisting, at times convoluted lines, a gentle melody gradually emerges."
--Notes by Emily Perryman
Shulamit Ran was born in Tel Aviv, Israel, where she received her early training
in music. She came to the U.S. at the age of fourteen to study, having received
scholarships from The Mannes College of Music in New York and the America
Israel Cultural Foundation. Among her numerous awards, fellowships and commissions
are those from the Martha Baird Rockefeller Fund, the Ford Foundation, the
National Endowment for the Arts, the Guggenheim Foundation, Chamber Music
America, the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, the Philadelphia Orchestra,
the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Baltimore Symphony, and many more. In
1990, Ms. Ran was appointed by Maestro Daniel Barenboim to be Composer-in-Residence
with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, a position she held for seven seasons.
From 1994 to 1997, Ran also served as Composer-in-Residence with the Lyric
Opera of Chicago. She is presently the William H. Colvin Professor in the
Department of Music at the University of Chicago, where she has taught since
1973.
You [unfolding] by Mark Kilstofte (commissioned by Theodore Antoniou
and Alea III and dedicated to cellist Leslie Nash)
You [unfolding] is a one-movement work comprising three contrasting sections.
It reflects, through form and process, the richness of discovery and understanding
at deeper and deeper levels-deliberately, yet imperceptibly-as if through
an extended correspondence. The opening features a series of statements in
expanding variations form in which each subsequent phrase can be heard as
an elaboration and amplification of the former. In other words, each new
phrase not only embellishes what has been played previously, but also introduces
new structural material. In this way the variations increase in length and
complexity, moving from the succinct to the sublime. In contrast to the slow,
improvisatory character of the first section, the central portion of the
work is suddenly brisk and terse, replete with syncopation. Here the notion
of unfolding is depicted by ever-widening intervallic wedges and ever-contracting
rhythmic cells which propel the piece to an abrupt, but lingering climax.
On the heels of this suspended caesura the piece reclaims the tempo and character
of the beginning. Here, however, each statement is condensed or abridged
(rather than elaborated on) as the work makes its way to what seems its inevitable
conclusion.-Notes by Katri Ervamaa
"Mark Kilstofte is admired as a composer of lyrical line, engaging harmony,
and strong, dramatic gesture, beautiful linear writing, expert text setting,
and keen sensitivity to sound, shape and event." So reads a recent citation
from the American Academy of Arts and Letters describing his music-qualities
stemming, in part, from years of vocal study. Winner of the 2002-03 Rome
Prize from the American Academy in Rome, Kilstofte holds degrees from St.
Olaf College and the University of Michigan where he studied with William
Albright, Leslie Bassett, William Bolcom and Eugene Kurtz, and served as
assistant conductor of the Contemporary Directions Ensemble. He is currently
associate professor of composition and music theory at Furman University.
In addition to the Frederick A. Julliard/Walter Damrosch Rome Prize Fellowship,
Kilstofte is also the recipient of the Goddard Lieberson Fellowship and Charles
Ive's Scholarship from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and the
ASCAP Foundation Rudolf Nissim Award. His music is published by the Newmatic
Press.
Wild Purple by Joan Tower
"I always thought of the viola sound as being the color purple. Its deep,
resonant and luscious timbre seems to embody all kinds of hues of purple.
I never thought of the viola as being particularly wild. So I decided to
try and see if I could create a piece that had wild energy in it and meet
the challenge of creating a virtuosic piece for solo viola."-Joan Tower "Wild
Purple" was written for the violist Paul Neubauer who premiered the work
at Merkin Concert Hall, New York City, September 1998.
Joan Tower is one of this generation's most dynamic and colorful composers.
Her bold and energetic music, with its striking imagery and novel structural
forms, has won large, enthusiastic audiences. For nearly thirty years,
Tower was active as founder and pianist with the 1973 Naumburg Award-winning
ensemble the Da Capo Chamber Players. They commissioned and premiered many
of her most popular works including: Platinum Spirals, Hexachords, Wings,
Petroushskates, and Amazon I. Also active as a conductor, Tower has
conducted at the White House, the Scotia Festival in Canada, and the American
Symphony Orchestra. She was the recipient of the Delaware Symphony's
1998 Alfred I. DuPont Award for Distinguished American Composers and Conductors,
and was inducted into the membership of the American Academy of Arts and
Letters. She is currently Asher Edelman Professor of Music at Bard
College, where she has taught since 1972. She is also co-artistic director
of the Yale/Norfolk Chamber Music Festival, and composer-in-residence at
the Summit Institute for the Arts and Humanities in Utah.
90+ by Elliott Carter
90+ for piano is built around ninety short, accented notes played in a slow
regular beat. Against these the context changes character continually. It
was composed in March of 1994 to celebrate the ninetieth birthday of my dear
and much admired friend, Goffredo Petrassi, Italy's leading composer of his
generation.-Notes by the composer
Born in New York City on 11 December 1908, Elliott Carter attended Harvard
University where he studied with Walter Piston, and later went to Paris where
for three years he studied with Nadia Boulanger. He then returned to New
York to devote his time to composing and teaching. With the explorations
of tempo relationships and texture that characterize his music, Carter has
been one of the prime innovators of 20th-century music he has been recipient
of the highest honors that a composer can receive: the Gold Medal for Music
awarded by the National Institute of Arts and Letters, the National Medal
of Arts, membership in the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the American
Academy of Arts and Sciences, and honorary degrees from many universities.
He has received two Pulitzer Prizes and commissions from prestigious organizations.
Eleven Preludes for Piano by Christian Wolff
This is a collection of self-contained pieces, each representing one principal
idea or process. Among his most accessible pieces, many of these preludes
are quite tuneful, with popular or politically connected American songs being
the influences. There is a lot of freedom in the interpretation of these
pieces, as they are left free of tempo, articulation, dynamic and phrase
markings. Yet, they are very spirited and outgoing; it is music that speaks
in a very direct way.
The French-born American musician Christian Wolff came to prominence in the
1950s as an associate of John Cage, Morton Feldman, Earle Brown and the other
American experimentalists of that period, later working with Cornelius Cardew
and Frederic Rzewski. His work has gone through many transformations, including
minimalism (the early 1950s), indeterminacy, open form and works connected
with political issues. His academic training in classics and comparative
literature at Harvard University lead him to professorships in classics at
Harvard and, since 1971, at Dartmouth College, where he also teaches comparative
literature and music. His academic training in classics and comparative literature
at Harvard University lead him to professorships in classics at Harvard and,
since 1971, at Dartmouth College, where he also teaches comparative literature
and music. Concert No. 2
Are You Brave Too ? Festival
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