Kronos Quartet
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Kronos Quartet Music For Change: The Banned Countries WHEN: VENUE: SATURDAY, OCTOBER 20 BING 7∶30 PM CONCERT HALL Jay Blakesberg Program Artists Franghiz Ali-Zadeh / Mugam Sayagi * Kronos Quartet David Harrington, violin * زللة Islam Chipsy (arr. Jacob Garchik) / Zaghlala Composed for Fifty for the Future: The Kronos Learning Repertoire John Sherba, violin Traditional (arr. Stephen Prutsman) / Wa Habibi (Beloved) + Hank Dutt, viola Sunny Yang, cello Ramallah Underground (arr. Jacob Garchik) / Tashweesh * Aftab Darvishi / Winds from South * Brian H. Scott, Lighting Designer World premiere Brian Mohr, Sound Designer Omar Souleyman (arr. Jacob Garchik) / La Sidounak Sayyada (I’ll Prevent the Hunters from Hunting You) + Izak Algazi (arr. Jacob Garchik) / Yetzav Ha-El + Kronos extends special thanks to Chris Lorway and everyone at Stanford Sahba Aminikia / Pareeshān (Abstracted) * Live, Abbas Milani and Roma Parhad Dmitri Yanov-Yanovsky / Chang-Music IV: Movement II * of Stanford University’s Hamid and Traditional (arr. Milad Yousufi) / Bia Ke Berem Ba Mazar + Christina Moghadam Program in World premiere Iranian Studies, Joel Tarman of Sunset Youth Services, Mira Nabulsi, and Dur-Dur Band (arr. Jacob Garchik) / Dooyo + Samuel Weiser, KPAA Intern. World premiere Hamza El Din (realized by Tohru Ueda) / Escalay (Water Wheel) * Stanford Live extends special thanks to Persian Student Association, Stanford Interstitial music: Refugee Research Project, Abbasi Bass lines by Mamadou Kouyaté * Program in Islamic Studies, Center World premiere for African Studies, Continuing Studies, Freeman Spogli Institute for Sound collages by David Harrington, Joel Tarman, and Nikolás McConnie-Saad * World premiere International Studies, Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education, Department of Music, The program will be performed without intermission. Stanford Global Studies Division, Center for East Asian Studies, CREEES * Written for Kronos + Arranged for Kronos Center for Russian, East European & Eurasian Studies, Department of Presented with support from Stanford University’s Religious Studies, History Department, Hamid and Christina Moghadam Program In Iranian Studies and the Department of Anthropology. PROGRAM SUBJECT TO CHANGE. Please be considerate of others and turn off all phones, pagers, and watch alarms. Photography and recording of any kind are not permitted. Thank you. 2 About the Program Music for Change: The Banned Countries access to the United States, a policy must illuminate the present moment. that targeted citizens from seven The Banned Countries builds on that Kronos Quartet has always looked to Muslim-majority nations, all of which legacy. Drawn from throughout the music as a model for how to move are represented in this program. From far-flung Muslim world, the concert through the world. A creative and its inception some 45 years ago as a features newly commissioned cohesive force that doesn’t heed or vehicle for George Crumb’s epochal arrangements, such as Dooyo by recognize borders, music provides an anti-war cri-de-coeur Black Angels, Somalia’s Dur-Dur Band and Winds irrefutable response to those seeking through extraordinary works like Steve from South by Iran’s Aftab Darvishi, as to divide and demonize peoples. Music Reich’s haunted Different Trains and well as pieces gleaned from Kronos’ for Change: The Banned Countries came the excavation of Cold War anxiety on long-standing repertoire. about in direct response to the 2017 the album Howl, USA, Kronos has Executive Orders severely restricting embraced the imperative that music —Program note by Andy Gilbert Jay Blakesberg Program Notes Franghiz Ali-Zadeh (b. 1947) “It begins as a meditation, in darkness, About Zaghlala, Andy Gilbert writes: Mugam Sayagi (1993) only the cello is lit, trying to wake the world with the call to prayer. The cello “If Kronos Quartet had a motto it might Franghiz Ali-Zadeh was born in Azerbai- is the composer’s voice—a woman. be something like: Taking string players jan, a republic of the Soviet States. She Nothing changes, and you don’t believe to places they’ve never been before. first came to prominence as a composer it can. It goes on and on, then With Jacob Garchik’s surging and performer while still a student of the suddenly, it explodes, in a flash! arrangement of Zaghlala (Blurred vision celebrated composer Kara Karayev. Ali- Concealed passion breaks out in wild caused by strong light hitting the eyes) by Zadeh is highly regarded for her creativ- dancing, or in virtuosic cadenzas. The Egyptian keyboardist Islam Chipsy, ity and distinctive style. Her violin plays an unbounded song of love Kronos not only transports intrepid compositions draw from the vocabulary where the soul flies high into the sky. string quartets to the ecstatic milieu of of modern European classical music, It’s a competition among them all— a Cairo nightclub, but the chart also including the Second Viennese School, who can be more perfect? Then comes literally turns one ensemble member and incorporate the sounds of mugham the finale, and an end. The cello is into a drummer, adding percussive (the main modal unit of Arabic music), alone again, intoning the sunset prayer. drive to the tune’s lapidary churn. As music traditional to Azerbaijan. As a The sound of the triangle echoes a part of Fifty for the Future, Kronos’ pianist, she performs at international myriad of stars.” ongoing project to make new music festivals, playing programs that include works readily available to aspiring the works of Crumb, Messiaen, and string ensembles, Garchik’s score is Schoenberg, composers she has popu- Islam Chipsy (b. 1985) accessible free on the Kronos website, larized for Eastern audiences. She is rec- Zaghlala (2017) ‘where you can see how the piece can ognized as a master interpreter of works Arranged by Jacob Garchik (b. 1976) be played in such a way that each one by 20th-century European and Ameri- of us can be the drummer,’ says David can composers, the Soviet avant garde, Islam Chipsy and his band EEK are a Harrington. ‘Wouldn’t it be cool if every and traditional Azerbaijani composers. three-way force of nature from Cairo, string quartet player in the world could Egypt described by those who’ve been be this Arabic drummer? So far Hank About Mugam Sayagi, caught in the eye of their storm as one Dutt is ours, but that’s not to say that Franghiz Ali-Zadeh writes: of the most exciting live propositions on the rest of us won’t do it at some point.’ the planet. At the core of the group lies “Kronos encouraged me to use the Azeri keyboard pioneer Islam Chipsy, whose “With his ear already drawn to the musical tradition of Mugami—a secret joyous, freewheeling sonic blitz warps region by the Arab Spring protests, language used in the 16th century to the standard oriental scale system into Harrington ‘kept coming back to Islam disguise emotions discouraged in Islam. otherworldly shapes, as flanked by Chipsy,’ he says. Part of Egypt’s Through Mugami, the ecstatic longing Mohamed Karam and Mahmoud Refat thriving underground music scene, of a man for a woman could be raining down a percussive maelstrom Chipsy’s EEK trio has carved out a expressed as the love of God. behind dual drum kits. singular sonic niche distinct from 4 the electro-chaabi artists who are “‘One of them actually has to play a incorporated European instruments almost required at wedding percussion instrument,’ he says. ‘That’s and European popular dance rhythms. celebrations. Raw and lo-fi, his music is always a challenge, but Kronos is not She also became known for her both virtuosic and unabashedly hand- afraid. For the other players, the parts renditions of Arab folk tunes and crafted: ’There’s a certain way that he are very rhythmic and syncopated. I religious songs. By the early 1960s plays where he takes his fist and slams simplified the drum part so that it’s Fairuz was a celebrity throughout the it into the keyboard that feels so playable for someone in a string Arab world; in her homeland, she is visceral and exciting,’ Harrington says. quartet. The challenge is to play sometimes known as the “Ambassador ‘There’s also this sense of fun and together and get a nice groove.’” to the Stars” for her emotional singing. abandonment. I can imagine thousands of people dancing.’ Traditional Ramallah Underground “Kronos premiered Zaghlala at NPR Wa Habibi (Beloved) Tashweesh (2008) Music’s 10th Anniversary Concert in [unknown/arr. 2003] Arranged by Jacob Garchik (b. 1976) December 2017. For Garchik, the Arranged by Stephen Prutsman challenge was capturing the torrential (b. 1960) Ramallah Underground (RU) is a textures generated by the drum kit musical collective, based in Ramallah, tandem of Mohamed Karam and Wa Habibi is a devotional hymn drawn Palestine, attempting to rejuvenate Mahmoud Refat and Chipsy’s from the Arab Christian tradition in Arabic culture through their music. RU keyboard, ‘which he plays like a Lebanon. Meditative and soul- was founded by artists Boikutt, percussionist,’ Garchik says, employing searching, it is often sung on Good Stormtrap, and Aswatt. They produce inexpensive, cracked software like Friday as celebrated in the Arab music ranging from hip hop to trip hop FruityLoops on a keyboard designed Orthodox Church. On this holy day, to down tempo. The members started for Middle Eastern scales. The the hymn evokes the love and sorrow off as producers; Boikutt and instrument allows him to play huge, of spiritual faith. This arrangement of Stormtrap later picked up the mic and swooping glissandos with a finger, Wa Habibi is based on an began to MC in Arabic, which added a ‘glissing an octave or more up or down, interpretation, recorded live on Easter political layer to the music. Their work and I wasn’t sure if Kronos would be in the early 1960s, by the legendary comes out of a deep sense of their able to handle the speed and range.