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Music Text Relationship in the Choral Music of Jennifer Higdon: Compositional Aspects Are Universally Spawned by the Text

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Music Text Relationship in the Choral Music of Jennifer Higdon: Compositional Aspects Are Universally Spawned by the Text 2019 HAWAII UNIVERSITY INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCES ARTS, HUMANITIES, SOCIAL SCIENCES & EDUCATION JANUARY 3 - 5, 2019 PRINCE WAIKIKI HOTEL, HONOLULU, HAWAII MUSIC TEXT RELATIONSHIP IN THE CHORAL MUSIC OF JENNIFER HIGDON: COMPOSITIONAL ASPECTS ARE UNIVERSALLY SPAWNED BY THE TEXT SKOOG, WILLIAM DEPARTMENT OF MUSIC RHODES COLLEGE MEMPHIS, TENNESSEE Dr. William Skoog Department of Music Rhodes College Memphis, Tennessee Music Text Relationship in The Choral Music of Jennifer Higdon: Compositional Aspects are Universally Spawned by the Text Synopsis: Jennifer Higdon is an internationally renowned composer, most notably for orchestral works and the remarkable success of her opera Cold Mountain, based on the novel by Charles Frazier with a libretto by Gene Scheer. It was commissioned by the Santa Fe Opera, the Minnesota Opera and the Philadelphia Opera, and premiered at Santa Fe, NM in 2015. It was so well received that every performance was sold out, adding a performance that also sold out. Santa Fe produced a recording of it (the only opera they have recorded in 21 years. This opera also received the International Award for Best World Premier, and was nominated for a Grammy Award in 2016. Music‐Text Relationship in the Choral Works of Jennifer Higdon As Represented In Her Large Form Choral Work, The Singing Rooms William Skoog Mention the name Jennifer Higdon (b. elements of music linked to text will no achievement who have significantly 1962) to most musicians and there is near doubt be threaded with a degree of influenced the field of composition. universal recognition and acclaim for her subjectivity. This study will offer work, essentially for her instrumental representative stylistic characteristics She has become one of America’s works. In opera circles, she is hailed as a found in her choral pieces, honing in on most acclaimed and most frequently rising star in contemporary opera due to various elements of composition and how performed living composers, and has the enormous success of Cold Mountain Higdon uniquely connects them to the become a major figure in and a current operatic commission words. Higdon is prolific in this genre, and contemporary classical music through underway. However, to most choral the compositional fabrics woven are so commissions that represent a wide musicians, there appears to be little varied and complex an analysis of all these range of genres, including orchestral, awareness of her accomplishments as a works would be beyond the scope of a single chamber, choral, vocal, opera, and composer or that she has written a article: a detailed analysis of her entire opus wind ensemble. substantial quantity of quality choral music. of choral music would result in a monograph Hailed by the Washington Post as to approach comprehensiveness. Examples Higdon’s choral works are prolific and “a savvy, sensitive composer with a from her larger choral work, The Singing keen ear, an innate sense of form and profound; varied, rich in colors and highly Rooms, will be cited to illustrate analytical acclaimed by those who know them. By her a generous dash of pure esprit,” her points, to detail specific techniques works have been performed own admission, her instrumental works and employed, and will serve to represent opera have largely overshadowed the choral throughout the world, and are enjoyed materials for the overall discussion of her by audiences at several hundred works. The analytical book, Jennifer Higdon works in this study. Composing in Color by Christina L. Reitz of performances a year and on over her instrumental works, has greatly expanded Her primary compositional tendencies sixty CDs. Higdon’s orchestral the awareness of her instrumental works, and trends relating music to text will be work, blue cathedral, is one of the whereas a similar reference is not yet articulated here; these trends and most performed contemporary available for her choral music. tendencies are seen in her small form orchestral compositions by a living choral works as well. (A list of Higdon’s American with more than 600 This article hopes to bring Higdon’s choral works is provided at the end of this performances worldwide since its choral works to light, exploring the works article.) It is hoped that this study may premiere in 2000. with respect to their implicit relationship of inspire additional analytical studies and music to text. As an analytical paper, it will One of Higdon’s most current performances of her contributions to the projects was an opera based on the reveal the intrinsic nature of that choral world. connection from a compositional best-selling novel, Cold Mountain, by standpoint and will also analyze its As Jennifer Higdon is not as well known in the Charles Frazier. It was co- immediate and demonstrable connection of choral community, a brief introduction to her commissioned by Santa Fe Opera, the creation of musical elements drawn seems appropriate. Higdon has won numerous Opera Philadelphia and Minnesota directly from the text. This is a deduction awards and received an abundance of Opera in collaboration with North that she wholeheartedly embraces. commissions from prestigious musical Carolina Opera. Higdon recently won organizations for orchestral works, operas, and the International Opera Award for A thorough analysis of her compositions choral compositions–large and small. Most Best World Premiere for this opera. demonstrates convincingly that the notably, her Viola Concerto won a Grammy for The Singing Rooms, her largest construction and musical choices are Best Contemporary Classical Composition in substantially inspired by the text. Structure, choral-orchestral work to date, was 2017, her Percussion Concerto won a Grammy commissioned by the Atlanta melody, harmony, counterpoint, rhythm, Award in the same category in 2010, and in the meter, textures, accompaniment (when Symphony and Chorus, the same year she received the Pulitzer Prize in Minnesota Orchestra and the present), give clear evidence all elements Music for her Violin Concerto, with the are intimately linked to the poetry. Often, Philadelphia Orchestra. On the Death committee citing Higdon’s work as “a deeply of the Righteous, another large several musical elements combine and engaging piece that combines flowing lyricism conspire to augment elements of text. choral-orchestral work was with dazzling virtuosity.” commissioned by The Mendelssohn Given the close relationship between A summary of her achievements from her Club of Philadelphia. music and text in these works, particularly website (www.jenniferhigdon.com) follows: regarding construction, it is tempting to Higdon’s choral works have been refer to her as a “Neo-Renaissance Higdon has received awards from overshadowed by those of other genres, composer,” as each line of text seems to the Guggenheim Foundation, the but this is changing, as evidenced in the create a new musical thought or region of American Academy of Arts & Letters growing number of prestigious choral construction. However, that description, (two awards), the Koussevitzky organizations performing her works, as while perhaps appropriate in some ways, Foundation, the Pew Fellowship in the well as the substantial and numerous would be a disservice in defining her overall, Arts, and the National Endowment for commissions being requested. This serves highly complex, compositional style. the Arts. Higdon received the as evidence of their worthiness of attention prestigious 2018 Nemmers Prize from and critical scrutiny, bringing them to a Attempting to summarize any composer’s Northwestern University which is level similar to her other genres. overall style and theoretical tendencies is awarded to composers of exceptional something of slippery slope, as interpretive Jennifer Higdon’s overall style in these works employs sophisticated forms 1 Music‐Text Relationship in the Choral Works of Jennifer Higdon As Represented In Her Large Form Choral Work, The Singing Rooms essentially based in traditional rehearsals and performance. Singers, as it relates to this empirical analytical constructions, decidedly tonal, yet unique instrumentalists and audience members discussion. and new in tonal and harmonic colors, receive her work with tremendous refreshing in their distinctive sounds. She enthusiasm and appreciation. It is with Large Form Choral Works normally utilizes relatively short motivic gratitude to Jennifer Higdon that she has The Singing Rooms (2007) is the largest ideas, developing them, expanding them, given strong support for this study. choral work in Jennifer Higdon’s opus. It is altering them into high-level fabrics of Higdon’s Choral Works a powerful, musical-poetic work, coupling contrapuntal ideas while employing six (6) lyrical poems by Jeanne Minahan interesting and complex rhythmic and Higdon’s choral works are abundant, into a series of art songs for chorus and harmonic notions that align with the text musically diverse and complex. They exist orchestra. A tour-de-force violin solo structure, enunciation and delivery. as large form works combined with dances throughout the work as a Thorough analysis reveals that Higdon orchestra, and as small form works connecting thread: it is, essentially a violin gives careful, implicit attention to the text in performed either a cappella or with concerto for chorus and orchestra. every musical element available to her in chamber instruments. The focus of this Higdon’s propensity for music serving the crafting these compositions. Her works, as paper will be to illustrate
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