MARSYAS TRIO

2 1 Canta, Canta! (1997) 3’44 In the Theatre of Air for alto fl ute, and (orig. cl/vc/pn) Judith Weir Several Concertos (1980) 2 Concerto for Violoncello 5’36 3 Concerto for Pianoforte 5’56 4 Concerto for Piccolo 3’19

5 Georgia Rodgers York Minster (2018) 5’25 Hilary Tann In the Theater of Air (2017) 6 Herons 1’29 7 Goldfi nches 1’41 8 Thrushes 1’41 9 Wild Geese 2’14 bl Hawk 2’25 bm White Owl 1’31 bn Starlings 4’50 Laura Bowler Salutem (2014) bo Stone Age 3’23 bp Bronze Age 3’06 bq The Middle Ages 2’56 br Industrial Revolution 3’07 bs Modern Age 4’03 Marsyas Trio Amy Beach Two Pieces for , Cello and Piano, Op. 90 (1921) bt Pastorale 3’31 Zubin Kanga piano bu Caprice, ‘Water Sprites’ 0’58 Helen Vidovich fl ute, alto fl ute, piccolo Valerie Welbanks cello Total timing 60’54

photo © Marshall Light Studio Studio Light © Marshall photo 3 Notes by Heather Roche As women composers and performers in of contemporary classical music that we the West, we no longer have to fi ght to lack political agency, the Marsyas Trio The year 2018 marks the 100th track’ accompanying the otherwise British be able to do the things we want to do make full use of theirs. anniversary of (some) women getting the lineup, with her modern-day equivalents. in the ways that Beach did. But we still Thea Musgrave’s Canta, Canta! vote in the UK, and is celebrated with this She was, early in life, recognised as fi ght for those things to be recognised appears here as an arrangement of an release by the Marsyas Trio, featuring one of the fi nest pianists in the United on equal terms: we want to be paid arrangement: the trio, Canta, Canta!, was works by fi ve living British composers and States, and performed as a soloist with equally, we want to be able to choose originally for clarinet, cello and piano, one notable American. the Boston Symphony at a to have families without sacrifi cing our and Marsyas fl autist Helen Vidovich time when she could neither vote, nor creativity and careers, and we want to 1918 marked a milestone in the feminist attend Harvard. However, following her worked together with Musgrave to create movement, and such milestones have see the work of women appear on every marriage in 1885 she was restricted to this version, with alto fl ute replacing the been since framed in terms of ‘waves’. concert programme. Women composers two performances a year, an order she clarinet. The trio itself is an arrangement The fi rst wave was primarily concerned are still underrepresented, largely obeyed until the death of her husband made by the composer in 1997 of a song with the vote. Three have followed, and ignored by orchestral programming, in 1910, when she resumed touring. from her own A Cantata for a Summer’s we are now arguably in the middle of the often discouraged from engaging with She was, however, encouraged by Day, written in 1954 for chorus and fourth, which is concerned chiefl y not technology, and regularly reminded her husband to continue composing chamber orchestra, commissioned by with the individual but with structural that their ambition is seen as ugly and during their marriage, and in general BBC Scotland and dedicated to the defi ciencies within society, and with the ‘unfeminine’. he encouraged her towards larger form memory of Lili Boulanger. The song need to speak out following the defeat of works and away from the songs that The Marsyas Trio celebrate the important arranged in Canta, Canta! is a setting of a Hillary Clinton in the 2016 US Presidential had mostly comprised her portfolio anniversary of women’s suffrage by poem by Maurice Lindsay (a friend of the election and what has been seen as a hitherto. She could not, as her male presenting works by women composers of composer and her regular collaborator gradual retrenchment on women’s rights. counterparts did, travel to Europe for multiple generations while acknowledging until his death in 2009), describing the We have, however, come a long way. It formal instruction; instead, she studied, that we are still not done. ‘Deeds not orange tiger lily burning bright in the hot is extraordinary to compare the life of copying and memorizing, the scores of Words’ ran the motto of the Women’s summer sun. This arrangement retains Amy Beach, the earliest composer to be orchestral pieces she heard performed by Social and Political Union (WSPU), the vocal colour of the original, the drama featured on this release, and presented the Boston Symphony Orchestra. and here is an album as deed: while and lyricism being passed between alto on this album as an American ‘bonus sometimes we may feel within the realm fl ute and cello lines.

64 75 Judith Weir’s Several Concertos was Georgia Rodgers’ York Minster, seven times, with one note removed from Tann uses a mix of playing techniques to commissioned by the ensemble Lontano commissioned by the Marsyas Trio, is the material on each repeat. express the movement of the birds, and in 1980. There are a few ‘fi rsts’ for part of a series of pieces, called Real structurally the piece resembles a wave, Welsh composer Hilary Tann mixes women associated with the work. Most Spaces, that explores the harmonic starting with the stillness of the herons, the musical and the visual in her piece, frequencies of resonant spaces. She moving towards tension and activity with recently, Weir has become the fi rst In the Theater of Air, commissioned by refers to these frequencies as the space’s the thrushes, wild geese and hawk, and woman to be made Master of the Queen’s the Marsyas Trio. It is not birdsong that ‘acoustic fi ngerprint’ and, in addition to fi nally the wave breaks with the white owl Music. In addition, Odaline de la Martinez, is the inspiration here, but the poetic York Minster, has also made pieces based and starlings. the fi rst woman to conduct at , description of seven different kinds of on St. Andrew’s Church at Lyddington in was the pianist in Lontano when the birds in movement. In order of their Laura Bowler’s Salutem was Rutland, and Maeshowe, a Neolithic tomb work was commissioned. Weir herself appearance in the piece, the birds are commissioned by the Marsyas Trio as in the Orkney Islands. The pitch material describes the piece as an ‘early curiosity’, Herons (‘in the black, polished water’), a partner piece to George Crumb’s Vox for the piece is derived from the acoustic a ‘sort of jeu d’esprit about late 1970s Goldfi nches (‘they swing on the thistles’), Balaenae, which lies at the core of the fi ngerprint of York Minster: a kind of complexity crashing into the concerto Thrushes (‘upward like rain, rising’), Marsyas Trio’s existing repertoire. Five modal scale is extracted by analysis manners of the traditional concert hall’. Wild Geese (‘high in the clean blue air’), movements of the Crumb are named of the impulse response of the space, Each of the three movements features Hawk (‘eyes fastened harder than love’), after geologic time periods: Archeozoic, with pitches at 71, 177, 335, 401, 284, one of the instrumentalists as soloist, White Owl (‘a buddha with wings’), and Proterozoic, Paleozoic, Mesozoic 354, 670 and 802 Hertz. These pitches Starlings (‘like one stippled star’). The and Cenozoic. Bowler extends these fi rst a concerto for Violoncello, then are converted into their nearest equally for Pianoforte and fi nally for Piccolo. text accompanying each bird comes from through the ages of humankind in fi ve tempered notes with cent deviation and the American poet Mary Oliver (hence movements: Stone Age, Bronze Age, The While each movement features a used extensively (but not exclusively) in the American spelling of the title) and her Middle Ages, Industrial Revolution and soloist — the violoncello solo full of the composition of the work. Structurally, collection Wild Geese. Once described Modern Age. Bowler makes extensive dramatic portamenti, the pianoforte solo the piece resembles Alvin Lucier’s as the ‘indefatigable guide to the natural use of extended playing techniques, rampant with intricate passage work, I am sitting in a room, in which the text world’, Oliver’s poems relate the human the voices (and screams!) of the low rumblings and violent clusters, and is recorded and played multiple times condition to nature; we are human, but instrumentalists, amplifi cation, auxiliary the piccolo solo one of lyrical gymnastics on the course of the piece, resulting in also animal. As she writes, ‘You only have instruments (a mortar and pestle in the between registers — the work remains gradual unintelligibility of the text. In the to let the soft animal of your body/love Stone Age, crotales in the Bronze age, virtuosic for all players throughout. Rodgers, the same music is repeated what it loves’. and wood and metal in the Industrial 86 7 Revolution) improvisation, and sampled and hints at the strength of Beach’s Rich and powerful musical language Judith Weir (b. 1954 to Scottish music. The piece is also theatrical: powers of orchestration. The Caprice and a strong sense of drama have made parents in Cambridge, England) studied players are instructed to play each other’s ‘Water Sprites’, not even a minute long, Scottish-American composer Thea composition with , Robin instruments, take selfi es and shout. passes swift running lines between the Musgrave (b. 1928) one of the most Holloway and Gunther Schuller. On The piece refl ects destruction wrought three instruments, as though the sprites respected and exciting contemporary leaving Cambridge University in 1976 by human intervention in the world: the Beach imagines follow the current of a composers in the Western world. Her she taught in England and Scotland, and banging grunts of the Stone Age, primitive fast running river in their play. works are performed in major concert in the mid-1990s became Associate building rhythms of the Bronze Age, halls, festivals, and radio stations on both Composer with the City of Birmingham © 2018 Heather Roche the furor of war in the Middle Ages, the sides of the Atlantic. Symphony Orchestra, and Artistic Director mechanisation and dehumanisation that of Spitalfi elds Festival. She was a Visiting begins with the Industrial Revolution, and Known for the clarity of her invention, the Professor at Princeton (2001), Harvard the gradual immersion into technology in skill of her orchestrations, and the power (2004), and Cardiff (2006-13), and the Modern Age. of her musical communication, Musgrave in 2014 was appointed Master of the has consistently explored new means of It was following the death of her husband Queen’s Music. In 2015 she became projecting essentially dramatic situations that Amy Beach became a repeat Associate Composer to the BBC Singers. in her music, frequently altering and resident of the MacDowell Colony in extending the conventional boundaries of She is the composer of several operas Peterborough, NH, and was instrumental instrumental performance by physicalising in starting the artists residency (written for , Scottish Opera, programme there. Indeed, it was on her their musical and dramatic impact. ENO and Bregenz) which have been widely performed. She has written fi rst visit there that she composed the Musgrave has been the recipient of many orchestral music for the BBC Symphony, two pieces presented on this album, her notable awards including two Guggenheim Boston Symphony and Minnesota Pastorale and Caprice ‘Water Sprites’, Fellowships, the Ivors Classical Music . Much of her music has been coincidentally written the year after Award 2018, and The Queen’s Medal for American women across the nation got recorded, and is available on the NMC , Music. She was awarded a CBE on the the vote. The Pastorale, sweet and lyrical Delphian and Signum labels. She blogs Queen’s New Year’s Honour List in 2002. in temperament, highlights the singing about her cultural experiences at www. capabilities of both the fl ute and cello, www.theamusgrave.com judithweir.com.

108 911 Georgia Rodgers (b. 1985) is a Department and is the John Howard Laura Bowler (b. 1986) is a composer, achieve success without the benefi t of composer of instrumental and electronic Payne Professor at Union College, vocalist and Artistic Director specialising European study – she was self-taught in music whose work focuses on textural Schenectady. in theatre, multi-disciplinary work and composition using treatises and studying and spatial aspects of sound and the opera. A professor of composition at the scores. Praised for its lyricism (‘beautiful, lyrical experience of listening. In 2016 she was Guildhall School of Music and Drama work’ Classical Music Web) and formal A remarkable child prodigy, she made selected as one of Sound and Music’s and at the Royal Northern College of balance (‘In the formal balance of this her public debut as a pianist in 1883, New Voices. Music, she is also the Founder and music, there is great beauty …’ Welsh Artistic Director of Size Zero Opera, a also the year of her fi rst published Georgia studied Physics and Music at Music), her music is infl uenced by a company specialising in the creation compositions. In 1885 she performed the University of Edinburgh followed by strong identifi cation with the natural and performance of contemporary with the Boston Symphony, but upon a Masters degree in computer music world. These two interests combine in her opera. She has been commissioned by her marriage to the distinguished taught by Michael Edwards. She is now enjoyment of haiku (she is a published HCMF, BBC Radio 3, BBC Symphony surgeon, Dr. H.H.A. Beach, she curtailed pursuing a PhD in composition at City haiku poet) and in text selections from Orchestra, Manchester Camerata, London her performing in accordance with his University, London, with a particular focus Welsh poets. A deep interest in the Philharmonic Orchestra, Quatuor Bozzini wishes, and focused on composition. on the perception of sound, space and traditional music of Japan has led to (Canada), Song Circus (Norway) and She made one performance per year, the human experience of listening. Her private study of the shakuhachi and guest Ensemble Phace (Austria) among many with the proceeds donated to charity, supervisor is Newton Armstrong. visits to Japan, Korea, and China. other groups both in the UK and abroad. and one of these performances was of She is also the vocalist for Aarhus based, her own piano concerto with the Boston Georgia also works part-time as an Her compositions have been widely Ensemble Lydenskab. Symphony Orchestra in 1900. Following acoustician for a fi rm of consulting performed and recorded by ensembles the death of her husband in 1910, she engineers, specialising in architectural such as the European Women’s Known as the fi rst female composer resumed performing, and toured Europe acoustics. She lives and works (and was Orchestra, Tenebrae, Lontano, Marsyas to have a symphony performed by a to great acclaim, performing her own born) in north London. Trio, Thai Philharmonic, Royal Liverpool major orchestra (her Gaelic Symphony, music, until the onset of WWI. After the Philharmonic, BBC National Orchestra of premiered by the Boston Symphony Welsh-born composer, Hilary Tann war, she continued performing, both in Wales, and KBS Philharmonic in Seoul, Orchestra in 1896), Amy Beach (née (b. 1947), lives in the foothills of the the U.S. and Europe, and she composed Korea. www.hilarytann.com Amy Marcy Cheney, 1867-1944) was Adirondack Mountains in Upstate also one of the fi rst US composers to more than 300 published works during New York where she chairs the Music have her music be recognized in Europe, her lifetime. More works have been and and the fi rst classical US composer to continue to be published since then. 1210 1311 Marsyas Trio performing Crumb’s Vox Balaenae at the Société de Musique Contemporaine Lausanne, photo © Patrick Dawkins The London-based Marsyas Trio, Cambridge Music Journal Tempo, formed in 2009 by graduates of the The Strad, and Australia’s Limelight Royal Academy of Music, is dedicated Magazine. The ensemble was joined by to music for fl ute, cello and piano from pianist Zubin Kanga in January 2017. the Classical era onwards. Aiming to The Marsyas Trio performs in rural Wales inspire a generation of new works for as part of the Arts Council of Wales’ this genre, they are uncovering lesser- Night Out scheme and has received known repertoire and are proactive in generous funding from the RVW Trust, commissioning new music. PRS Foundation, Hinrichsen Foundation, Ambache Charitable Trust, Fidelio The Trio has toured abroad in Europe Charitable Trust, Britten-Pears Foundation and China, has performed at festivals and Arts Council England. throughout the UK including the Vale of Glamorgan and Three Choirs Festivals, Marsyas Trio takes its name from Greek at the Holywell Music Room (Oxford mythology – inspired by the bold, spirited Society), in London for passion of Marsyas, the celebrated pipe- Spitalfi elds Music, St John’s Smith Square playing satyr who dared challenge Apollo and Conway Hall, and in Switzerland at in a musical contest. the Société de Musique Contemporaine www.marsyastrio.com Lausanne. This concert was broadcast on the Swiss Radio station RTS Espace 2. The Trio has also appeared live on BBC Radio 3 ‘In Tune’, Classic FM Bulgaria, and Bulgarian National Television. Their CD, A Triple Portrait (Meridian Records 2015) received airtime on European radio and reviews internationally, including

14 1513 THANK YOU SUPPORT The Marsyas Trio would like to thank ... NMC RECORDINGS PRODUCERS’ CIRCLE As a registered charity (no. 328052) NMC holds The Britten-Pears Foundation for supporting Anonymous, Robert D. Bielecki Foundation, Anthony Bolton, Bill a distinctive position in the recording industry, the commission of Laura Bowler’s Salutem, Connor, Luke Gardiner, Nicholas and Judith Goodison, Ralph providing public benefi t through the contribution the Fidelio Charitable Trust and the RVW Trust Kanza, George Law, Colin Matthews, Nick Prettejohn, Simon and our work makes to enriching cultural life. Victoria Robey, James and Anne Rushton, Richard Steele, Janis for supporting the commission of Hilary Tann’s In the Theater of Air, and the Kickstarter supporters who Susskind, Andrew Ward, Judith Weir, Arnold Whittall. Becoming a Friend of NMC allows you to funded the commission of Georgia Rodgers’ York Minster. support the most exciting new music from the AMBASSADORS British Isles and helps secure NMC’s future. We Hilary Tann, Sandra Akerman, Patrick Dawkins, Richard Lee, and everyone else who generously City & Cambridge Consultancy, Dominic Nudd, Tarik O’Regan, provide a range of opportunities for our donors contributed to their Kickstarter campaign for making this album possible. Duncan Tebbet, Peter Wakefi eld. to see behind the scenes of the organisation Royal Holloway, University of London, for the use of its premises for recording, and the Royal Academy of and the music we release. PRINCIPAL BENEFACTORS Music for the generous loan of the c.1740 G.F. Celoniatus cello (all tracks except Amy Beach). 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