Ruth Lomon

for flute, TAB flute, B-flat clarinet, piano, violoncello, and vibraphone

1. Mizmaze

2. Warp and Weft

3. Navajo: Weaving the Yei

4. Penelope’s Web

Mizmaze is an intricate network of pathways enclosed by hedges or plantations. Warp and Weft has two textures running through the movement to create a musical ‘warp and weft’. The pizzicato of the cello throughout the movement is intertwined with the melodic lines of the other instruments. Navajo: Weaving the Yei refers to the Navajo rugs that have the figures of the Yei, Navajo deities, woven into the rugs. You will hear references to songs of the Navajo and some chants. Penelope’s Web is a proverbial expression for work which is ongoing but never completed. The myth gave me a frame for the changing textures of this movement, building a thick texture with all the instruments and thinning to long solo flute passages accompanied by vibraphone tremolo chords.

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Ruth Lomon

for string quartet

ca. 18'30"

The Janus Quartet was composed during a stay at the MacDowell colony in Peterborough, N.H. I was there during the months of November and December in 1983. As I started to work on the quartet the snow began to fall – it was a very straight snowfall – not a trace of wind. The windows of my studio looked out on stands of firs and slender birches. The opening of this quartet tries to capture that serenity. The theme is shared between the two violins; the viola and cello are playing a D harmonic with the viola playing the note a quarter tone higher. You probably won't experience this as another tone but as a beat or pulsing of the note. This section is titled ''when the snow is falling." There follows a lively melodic and rhythmic development which closes at midpoint in the piece with a section reflecting the quarter-tone pedal point of the opening and leading into a recapitulation of what I'll call the ''snow'' theme, this time with the theme dispersed through the four instruments. This recapitulation leads into the second section of the quartet titled ''Remembrance of things passed." You may hear an echo of Schumann, a short phrase from Barber's Adagio for Strings, perhaps too short to pick it out but these echoes set the mood of this section. A quote from Beethoven's 15th quartet heightens the drama and leads into a climax coming to rest on a calm, cantabile close. The cellist closes with a theme which has been used as an accompaniement to the little fragments of Schumann and Barber. It is a quote from a setting of Blake's poem INJUNCTION which I composed in 1962.

The Angel that presided o'er my birth said

"little creature born of joy and mirth

Go love without the help of anything on earth".

Composed for the Janus String Quartet during a residency at the MacDowell Colony. 

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Ruth Lomon

for clarinet/bass clarinet, cello, vibraphone/tomtoms, and piano

Weaving(s):

1. Mizmaze

2. Warp and Weft

3. Navajo: Weaving the Yei

4. Penelope's Web

Mizmaze is an intricate network of pathways enclosed by hedges or plantations. "He hath walked the whole labyrinth and mizmaze of his life." (Beza) Warp and Weft has two textures running through this movement to create a musical "warp and weft." The pizzicato of the cello throughout the movement is intertwined with the melodic lines of the other instruments. Navajo: Weaving the Yei refers to the Navajo rugs that have the figures of the Yei, Navajo deities, woven into the rugs. You will hear references to some songs of the

Navajo. Penelope's Web is a proverbial expression for anything which is perpetually doing and never done. While Ulysses was off fighting the wars Penelope wove her tapestry every day and undid the work every evening to keep her suitors at bay. She held off their proposals by saying that she would not make a commitment to any of them until she had finished weaving the funereal robe for Laertes, her father-in-law.

The myth gave me a frame for the changing textures of this movement, building a thick texture with the four instruments, and thinning to long solo passages with tremolo chordal treatments in the vibraphone and piano solos.

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Ruth Lomon

for piano quartet

ca. 13'45"

"Wolves can move very softly. The sound they make is in the manner of Los Angelos Timidos, the shyest angels. First they fall back and shadow the creature they're curious about. Then, all of a sudden, they appear ahead of the creature peeking half-face with one golden eye from behind a tree. Abruptly the wolf turns and vanishes in a blur of white ruff and plumed tail, only to backtrack and pop up behind the stranger again. That is shadowing".

 - from "Women Who Run With Wolves", Clarissa Pinkola Estes, author

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Ruth Lomon

for cello and piano

ca. 19'00"

1. The Source.  A virtuosic movement for the cello in a spirited dialogue with the piano

2. Emergence.  The cello has a dramatic soliloquy with encouragement from the piano.

3.  Imago.  ‘Tempo di tango’ opens the 3rd movement  leading into a swift, vibrant duo that concludes with a recap of ‘tempo di tango’.

Commissioned for the Carnegie Recital Hall debut of Elizabeth Dolin.

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Anna Rubin

5 instrument version for flute (piccolo), clarinet in Bb (bass clarinet), violin, cello, and piano

6 instrument version for flute (piccolo), clarinet in Bb (bass clarinet), violin, cello, piano, and percussion (vibraphone)

ca. 10'30"

Dreaming Fire, tasting Rain was originally written while I was working on my Ph.D at Princeton University. The Nash Ensemble of London premiered the work at Princeton. The 6 instrument version includes percussion and is intended for performance by the Ruckus Ensemble at the University of Maryland Baltimore County. The images of fire and rain translated into a variety of musical textures – sometimes serene and sometimes jagged and thorny. In the opening, heterophonic or layered melodies surge and then subside. A middle section begins with the lonely sound of the piccolo against spiky cello pizzicati and then builds to a driving pulsed rhythm, intensified with percussion. The music then eases into a lyrical cello melody against a background of rolling piano chords and flute and violin countermelodies.

The 5 instrument version has been performed at Oberlin College Conservatory, the University of Maryland Baltimore County, and the Heidelberg College Festival of Women.

The 6 instrument version of the piece premieres in 2024 at the University of Maryland Baltimore County.

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Anna Rubin

for soprano, flute, oboe, Bb clarinet, bassoon, horn in F, piano, violin, viola, violoncello, and contrabass

De Nacht was written while I was studying in Amsterdam with Ton de Leeuw in 1983. I composed it for a competion run by the Delta Ensemble and was awarded first prize. I assembled the text, which is an impressionistic collage drawn from several sources including Near Eastern mythology and Malcolm’s X’s own life. Words from several languages are used. I was very influenced by the mythological works of Joseph Campbell and his concept of the hero’s journey. The piece is in two broad sections. Melodic fragments are set against fast, pizzicato and staccato accompanimental figures in the first part. It builds to a dramatic climax and is followed by a serene closing section which is a setting of a Hawaaian creation song.

At a time when the earth was hot,

At a time when the heavens turned about,

At a time when the sun was darkened to cause the moon to shine,

The slime, the source of the earth, the source of the night, that made the night,

Intense darkness! The deep darkness, the darkness of the sun, darkness of the night, the night gives birth.

The piece premiered at The Icebreaker (Het Ijsbreker), Amsterdam, in 1983 was performed several times after by the ensemble.

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Anna Rubin

for string quartet

Flames Rising and Falling to the Sea is a one-movement work emphasizing melismatic and florid writing in a hereophonic texture. The note D perfumes the piece anchoring the atonal language of the piece.

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Anna Rubin

for flute, cello, and percussion

Marguerite’s Dance - Infusion Ensemble - was written while I was in residence at the American Dance Festival with the Composers Choreographer’s Workshop at Duke University led by Earle Browne in 1981. The EAR Unit premiered the work and has performed it several times since then as well as performances at The Barge in Brooklyn and at the California Institute of the Arts. Spiky melodies emphasizing major 7ths are passed between the instruments in a 3-part slow-fast-slow succession. I am indebted to Erike Duke Fitzgerald, Dorothy Stone and Dan Kennedy for their collaboration on this piece.

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Patricia Ann Repar

for flute, oboe, B-flat clarinet, percussion, piano, violin, violoncello, ocean drum, and voice

ca. 14'00"

There is the blue we feel

in the presence of human suffering and separateness

[stylish, solo voices, self-important melodies interrupting, competing]

And there is the blue we see from above

peaceful, swirling speck of beauty on the soul of our universe

[gentle voices reminding, connecting us to life before and beyond]

There are those who carry us from the one blue to the other.

I have written this piece in honor of them–

it is time to share in and realize their Vision of Blue

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Patricia Ann Repar

flute/piccolo, B-flat clarinet, voice, violin, violoncello, contrabass, and tape

ca. 11'00"

Note to performers and listeners: written in celebration of my cousin Jerry Leon who made the last of his many adventures on earth while skiing in February of 2004.

Note to self: Find the Hawaiian chant secretly embedded on the ‘Ulalena’ CD; And on ‘The Master Chanters of Hawaii’ use “e ulu, e ulu, kini o ke akua” (Inspire us, inspire us, O gods).

Note to Jerry:            whispers of other times and places

                                    both mythic and real

                                    souls and gypsies

                                    long passed and yet to come

                                    but I see you

                                    bright, strong, and clear

                                    like water

                                    atop, within, above, and beyond

                                    Red Mountain.

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Patricia Ann Repar

for flute, violin, cello, percussion, and piano

ca. 9'15"

"In the pampas, down a tree lined lane, live three people who once saw the names of loved ones and strangers burned out life, yet they keep those names alive in memory. They give the names of those who vanished to birds so that the sky above their estancia is always alive with flying names."

--Lawrence Thornton

Imagination, memory, and breathing, all tend to be illusive in our lives–that is–until a moment of crisis when they become more real than all the Wheels of Fortune spinning us round about in our oh-so-busy lives. In Imagining Argentina Lawrence Thornton describes one of those critical moments and how the power of memory, imagination, and human breath, recreated and transformed it–ultimately dismembering the military dictatorship of Argentina. The performers and myself offer this piece in honor of Thornton–in honor of those many Argentinians who adamantly and courageously refuse to forget their own dreams and desires for beauty–in honor of you, may you hear the birdsong, remember the names, and re-imagine the moments of your lives.

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Patricia Ann Repar

for flute, oboe, alto saxophone, vibraphone, violoncello

ca. 10'15"

(out)(in)...the OPEN is written in honor of the legendary jazz singer/songwriter Billie Holiday. On the liner notes of Billie's 1956 recording The Essential Billie Holliday–Carnegie Hall Concert, Gilbert Millstein wrote that "Billie was the victim of a world which really could not have cared much less–either for her or for any artist whose talent might be grudgingly acknowledged or eagerly exploited, but who made society uncomfortable or uneasy." Billie's way of singing defiantly exposed herself and her listeners–an experience they yearned for and resented all at the same time. As a way of highlighting Billie's courage to be open, to say it and sing it how it is (not how we might want to hear it), (out)(in)...the OPEN is structured entirely around breath sounds. It is hoped that concentration on breath, by both performers and audience, will evoke some of this vulnerability that Billie and her listeners longed to experience.

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Caterina Calderoni

for violin, cello, and piano

I happen to visualize sounds as a color spread by means of broad brushstrokes over the timeline. Its shade, although apparently even, discloses ripplings, thickenings, and nuances that make it restless and sometimes violent, like the blue of deep waters or moonless nights.

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Caterina Calderoni

for flute, B-flat clarinet, violin, cello, and piano

ca. 8'00"

The formal structure of this work follows a spiral scheme based on a sequence of four sonic states (A: resonance – B: thickening – C: shattering – D: echo) that recurs four times, each time in a wider span of time. Moments of suspension (Tempo sospeso) frame and break in this cyclic process in order to reveal the sonic substance from which the spiral originates. Just like the shape of a shell (murex), the spiral suggests an endless process “towards infinity.”

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Rahilia Hasanova

for orchestra

ca. 10'00"

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Rahilia Hasanova

for chamber orchestra

ca. 15'50"

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Rahilia Hasanova

for 8 cellos and 4 double basses

ca. 22'00"

This piece was also entitled "Mughfil."

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Rahilia Hasanova

for orchestra

ca. 14'34"

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Rahilia Hasanova

for orchestra

ca. 12'00"

Everything in Life is Vibration (Albert Einstein). Everything has its own unique vibration, frequency, and sound. It means everything has a unique voice that is an expression of its vibrations and frequencies. Everything...snowflakes, crystals, flowers, take on their shapes according to their particular vibrations and responding to multiple vibrations, sounds, and voices of the universe. The universe is a choir of the myriad of voices. Each voice has to find the shape and expression to resonate with the universe. Each voice, if it is out of the connection with the choir of voices of the universe, is the solitary voice.

The Solitary Voice was premiered by the symphony orchestra of University of Maryland Baltimore County on November 22, 2015. Conductor: E.Michael Richards

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