- What Remains (2019)
-
Linda Dusman
for orchestra
ca. 11'15"
What Remains constitutes the second piece in a series of works embodying the concept of pis aller—“paths of last resort,” for me a fitting metaphor for our time of great immigrations, political extremes, and sudden local disruptive violence. What Remains explores specifically the human trait of obsession that often drives individuals to this final recourse, and that path’s potential for leading toward both great good and great evil.
What remains at its end? The air we breathe, the lives that air enables, our shared potential for good, and the possibility of an arrival at that end, rather than its opposite. What Remains stands as a reminder of humanity’s collective responsibility to walk a path away from obsessive violence and ugliness toward intentional peace and beauty.
The recording heard when viewing the score was recorded by the John Hopkins Symphony conducted by Jay Gaylin.
- Mother of Exiles (2019)
-
Linda Dusman
for flute, clarinet, violin, cello, double dass, harp, percussion, and piano
ca. 9'30"
What must our Lady Liberty be thinking? Staunchly guarding the NewYork harbor, sending a beacon of light still, but now a museum, what are her sonic memories of mothers singing to comfort their children? Mother of Exiles, your huddled masses are now at our southern borders, where there is a wall instead of a beacon of hope. How do we create a more perfect union, when we are faced so dramatically with the imperfections of our past and our present? What would that union sound like?
I want to express my appreciation to the cultures that created the lullabies quoted in this work: Syria, Nigeria, and the Andes region. My hope is that our shared concerns of caring for the young might bring these disparate voices together to forge a sustainable future. Any royalties resulting from performances of this work will be donated to Unicef, the United Nations agency for children.
The performance was recorded by the Inscape Chamber Orchestra, conducted by Richard Scerbo.
- Dance (2012)
-
Sofia Kamayianni
for youth symphony orchestra
ca. 3'00"
This piece was premiered in 2015 by the UMBC Symphony under the direction of E. Michael Richards, and the video recording is linked below.
Click here to view a performance (YouTube).
- The Mystery of r/r/r (2009)
-
Sofia Kamayianni
for piano quartet (violin, viola, cello, and piano)
The piece, written in 2004, is built from three parts with bridge passages between each part in the form of solo piano sections. The mystery refers to my esoteric world at that time as well as to several abstract senses that I could not explain to myself. The ostinato of the third part is based on a Greek word meaning 'unsolved', with the mystery ending up in this way.
The linked video recording was performed by Airi Yoshioka (violin), Maria Lambros (viola), Gita Ladd (cello), and Audrey Andrist (piano).
Click here to view a performance (YouTube).
- Stigmi-Anadrasi ("Moment-Feedback") (2002)
-
Sofia Kamayianni
for string quartet
ca. 4'45"
- Ano throsko ("Upward Gaze") (2009)
-
Sofia Kamayianni
for string Orchestra and children's choir
ca. 5'30"
- Luminescence (2004)
-
Annea Lockwood
for baritone voice, flute, trumpet, viola, cello, piano, percussion, and speaking voice
Luminescence was commissioned by Thomas Buckner, and is based on poems from Etel Adnan's SEA, which evoke the Lebanese coast of the Mediterranean, her birthplace. The Pacific Ocean is also a strong presence in her life as in Thomas Buckner's and mine, and so the piece celebrates our three-way friendship and our shared love of that ocean, which influenced the first song: here, the phrase lengths match the timing of long Pacific waves which I recorded in New Zealand, some years ago.
Click here to listen on Annea Lockwood's website.
- Janus Quartet (1983)
-
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.
- The Talisman (1989)
-
Ruth Lomon
for two clarinets, violin, viola, and live electronics
ca. 12'00"
Scored for two clarinets, violin, viola, 'cello and synthesizer, The Talisman was commissioned by Boston based Dinosaur Annex in 1989 with the proviso that one component should be live electronics. The seven sounds created with computer and Opcode Librarian and played from the synthesizer have a symbiotic relationship with the live instruments. The electronic sounds I wanted to use dictated the way I wrote for the live instrument and conversely, the qualities I wanted from the instruments lead my search for a balanced electronic counterpart. The Talisman was written for my daughter who was nursing a terminally ill child. You will hear inflections of 'hush little baby...' in the rocking motion of the strings and in the viola which plays a full quote at the end of the piece.
The performers in this recording are currently unknown.
- Shadowing (1995)
-
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. Abrupt 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
The performers in this recording are currently unknown.
- Dreaming Fire, Tasting Rain
-
Anna Rubin
for flute, B-flat clarinet, violin, viola, cello, and piano
ca. 10'30"
- De Nacht: Lament for Malcolm X (1983)
-
Anna Rubin
for soprano, violin, viola, violoncello, contrabass, flute, oboe, clarinet, bassoon, horn, and piano
- Viola a Tre
-
Anna Rubin
for three violas
- Flames Rising and Falling to the Sea (1988)
-
Anna Rubin
for string quartet
Flames Rising from the Sea (1988) for string quartet 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.
- Alex (2014)
-
Patricia Ann Repar
for oboe, viola, and tape
ca. 9'45"
it's endless weeping
one slowly descending tear at a time
with a hint of tenderness
hovering in the sweet echoes of lullaby
but mostly it's thunder and rigor and passionate commitment
for nothing more than a
single moment of connection
and an unremarkable knowing
that somewhere the weeping has stopped
Special thanks to the artists and producers of the CD The Thula Project: An Album of South African Lullabies. The digital accompaniment for Alex includes short excerpts from 3 of the cuts on the CD- Homolela Ngwanaka, Umlolozelo and Rhaliwent.
- Ondes Doubles (1971)
-
Eleanor Hovda
for flute, viola, harp, and Ondes Martenot
- Cheetah (1992)
-
Eleanor Hovda
for flute, oboe, Bb clarinet, bassoon, viola, electric bass, percussion
Cheetah is written for Relache, and was completed on December 24, 1992. I have used the image of cheetahs for several reasons. I wanted to work with extremes of energy (from relaxed to intense-but-inward to most extroverted, flung energy). I also wanted to work with the idea of excavating sounds from the bone and sinew of acoustic instruments: the expansions of single pitches, either fingered or bowed, which can happen when extremes of breath control, additions of auxillary keys and alternative fingerings (winds) and larger spectra of bowing techniques and placements (strings) are used. Cheetahs are said to be the fastest animals on earth when they run, but their sprints are very short. The rest of the time they spend recovering from their runs or preparing for the next dash by scoping out the landscape with intense focus, from stationary positions or by prowling. I imagine an enormous amount of energy and motion in the stillness flowing from them during these periods of intense focus.
- Onyx (1991)
-
Eleanor Hovda
for chamber orchestra
ca. 13'45"
This piece was commissioned by the Lake Superior Chamber Orchestra.
- Devil's Punchbowl (1993)
-
Lois V Vierk
for orchestra
This piece was inspired by the twisted sandstone canyon in the southern California high desert in Angeles National Park called "Devil's Punchbowl". At this exquisite site you are always aware of both extreme beauty and also danger. Descending into the canyon the trail is rugged, rocky, and treacherous, and the head is scorching. But rising up from the deep gorge are steep, magnificent mountains with their cold streams and sweet smelling pine trees. The vistas are grand. Far in the distance, soft shapes and hues of the landscape melt into one another.
Devil's Punchbowl unfolds slowly. Musical materials are constantly developed, pushing the work forward from a relatively simple beginning to its dynamic and colorful climax. The piece opens with languorous brass slides downward. String phrases answer the brass, and woodwinds add color and wisps of melody. Gradually the strings begin their long ascending glissando, sweeping the woodwinds up to their highest register, ending the first section.
Immediately strings and low woodwinds enter with agitated multi-color, ever-changing trills and tremolos. Various instruments combine to form sinewy melodic shapes which creep slowly upward. Percussion becomes more pronounced. Brass adds rhythm and harmony. Each phrase builds on the one before as, little by little, the music becomes faster, louder, and rhythmically emphatic. Trombones and celli playing fortissimo glissandi in the lowest register propel the piece to its full orchestral climax. After the high energy of the climax the music returns briefly to the lyrical mood of the opening, ending gently.
Devil's Punchbowl was commissioned by the Bang On A Can Festival and the Roanoke Symphony Orchestra. The commissioning of this work was made possible by a grant fro the Meet The Composer/Reader's Digest Commissioning Program, in partnership with the National Endowment for the Arts and the Lila Wallace-Reader's Digest Fund.
The recording of Devil's Punchbowl is of the premiere, given by Victoria Bond conducting the Roanoke Symphony Orchestra on March 21, 1994. They performed the piece beautifully.
Below are two versions of the score. First is the final version, incorporating several sets of edits to the orchestration made after the premiere and over subsequent years, and which is dated 2009. The major changes to orchestration, emphasizing an expanded role for trombones, etc., are marked above the staves of the score.
The second is the original score as used by Victoria Bond in 1994 (with numerous indications marked for my first set of edits).
Click here to view the revised score.
Click here to view the original score.
- Timberline (1991)
-
Lois V Vierk
for piano/synthesizer, flute, clarinet, bassoon, viola, contrabass, and percussion
Hiking a trail to high altitudes takes you through an ever changing landscape. The dark closeness of the forest gradually gives way to increasing spaciousness. Light shimmers in as hints of the grandeur ahead draw you up the mountain. Arriving at the timberline and then at the mountain top gives you a spectacular view of the land below and the sky all around you.
This work is in two continuous sections. The first section begins with winds and strings in the mid range, playing held notes and slow glissandi. Simple grace notes are added. Little by little a dense texture is built as grace notes are transformed into ascending pentatonic scale passages in winds and strings. This is overlaid contrapuntally with a piano texture of ornate grace notes, tremolos and trills, gradually moving up over the full range of the keyboard. Cymbals roll at the climax.
The second section begins under the ringing cymbals with slow, open fifths in the lowest register of the winds and strings. The sounds are dark and languid, with many sliding tones. Very gradually more percussive sounds are added. Phrases are becoming shorter, notes are getting faster, shifting from whole notes to half notes to quarters. The piano begins a bright and rhythmic punctuation of the phrase, introducing 16th notes. The development of this rhythmic and harmonic figure gradually moves the piece to its climactic conclusion. Finally all the instruments combine to form one texture--dynamic, rhythmic, covering the entire instrumental range.
Timberline was commissioned for the Relâche Ensemble of Philadelphia by Kobrand, Inc., importer of Champagne Taittinger.
A CD recording was released on New World Records -- Lois V Vierk: Words Fail Me, New World 80766.
Recording is by the Relâche Ensemble of Philadelphia, conducted by Lloyd Shorter, from CD:
New World Records 80766 "Lois V Vierk: Words Fail Me"
Click here to view the CD on New World Records.