PARTITA FOR 8 VOICES HOLLAND FESTIVAL PARTITA FOR 8 VOICES Roomful of Teeth thanks to production partner patron CONTENT Info & context Credits Programme Notes About the artists Friends Holland Festival 2019 Join us Colophon INFO CONTEXT date & time introduction Sat 15 June 2019, 8.30 pm by René van Peer 7.45 pm venue Muziekgebouw running time 1 hour 30 minutes including one interval CREDITS music William Brittelle Caleb Burhans Judd Greenstein Caroline Shaw performed by Roomful of Teeth Eric Dudley Thomas McCargar Estelí Gomez Abigal Lennox Martha Cluver Thann Scoggin Cameron Beauchamp Caroline Shaw with support from Brook Foundation website Roomful of Teeth PROGRAMME Done No Why Say Do (2010) William Brittelle Beneath (2010) Caleb Burhans The Isle (2016) Caroline Shaw AEIOU (2009) Judd Greenstein interval Partita for 8 Voices (2009-2011) Caroline Shaw NOTES Caroline Shaw Roomful of Teeth have been hailed as the future of choral music. The eight singers that make up the American vocal ensem- ble – four women, four men – together span five octaves, and accordingly their range runs the full gamut from deep growl to high-pitched shriek. Three of them have perfect pitch; all eight of them are classically trained. Singer and conductor Brad Wells established the group in 2009 and since then has flown in a host of different experts to teach his singers the most wide-ranging and obscure vocal techniques in an effort to broaden their pal- ette. From yodelling to death metal growling and throat singing - there’s nothing that’s too out there for the ensemble. The bulk of their repertoire has been written especially for them, and so they are able to incorporate all of these disparate techniques into their concerts, resulting in a truly unique sound. Brad Wells considers it his mission to break with the centuries-old traditions that have come to be rules set in stone in the world of Western vocal music. He and the predominantly young, progres- sive composers he works with manage to make music that sounds classical and modern at the same time – as much folk music as it is high art. One of those composers is Bryce Dessner, who wrote his recent composition for Triptych (which can be seen at the Holland Festival this year) especially for Roomful of Teeth. In a recent article in The New Yorker titled ‘Roomful of Teeth Is Revolutionizing Choral Music’, Wells cites Dutch composer Louis Andriessen, who once declared that his generation of composers had freed instruments to play beyond their prescribed sounds, and that it is now the younger generation’s time to free the voice. When he founded Roomful of Teeth, he told the singers that he didn’t want the group to sing the standard choral repertoire, nor songs from other cultures. The goal was nothing less than to build a ‘new kind of instrument’ – not copying, but creating from scratch. Done No Why Say Do (2010) - William Brittelle William Britelle: ‘Done No Why Say Do was written during a sum- mer residency a few years back as a companion piece to High Done No Why with the goal of integrating the poppier edges of my music interests at the time (Kanye West, in particular) with some of the extended techniques we were tackling during the residency.’ Beneath (2010) - Caleb Burhans Caleb Burhans: ‘In my piece Beneath, I was looking to explore the full vocal range of Roomful of Teeth, which spans over four octaves. The title is drawn from an episode of the television show Buffy the Vampire Slayer entitled From Beneath You, It Devours.’ The Isle (2016) - Caroline Shaw Caroline Shaw: ‘The Isle begins with a cloud of murmuring voices – a musical imagining of something hinted at in Shakespeare’s stage directions in The Tempest. The calls for “a burden, dispers- edly” and “solemn music” suggest an off-stage refrain and/or perhaps something even more otherworldly. In Shakespearean Metaphysics, Michael Witmore writes: “Like the island itself, which seems to be the ultimate environment in which the play’s action takes place, music is a medium that flows from, within, and around that imaginary place into the ambient space of performance proper. If some of the courtiers from Naples and Milan are lulled to sleep by the island’s ‘solemn music’, the audience can hear this music in a way that it cannot feel the hardness of the boards that the sleeping players lie on.” In taking cues from this reading of the play, I’ve constructed my own musical reading of the island of The Tempest. Three mono- logues, by Ariel, Caliban, and Prospero, are set in three distinct ways. Ariel’s initial song of welcome appears, for the most part, homophonically, although its break from the quasi-robotic deliv- ery (into the “burden, dispersedly”) points to the character’s va- porous and ethereal nature. Caliban’s famous description of the island as “full of noises” finds its home in a distraught and lonely monodic song, ornamented and driven by extraneous sounds. Prospero’s evocation of the various features and inhabitants of the island (from the final act) breaks apart into spoken voices that eventually dissolve into the wordless voices of the beginning, mirroring his pledge to throw his book of spells into the sea (and possibly to return to the island’s pre-lingual state). The harmonic material of the beginning and the end of the piece (the murmur- ing voices) is a 24-chord progression that includes all major and minor triads of the Western 12-note system (for fun). As Prospero says: “But this rough magic I here abjure, and when I have re- quired some heavenly music, which even now I do, to work mine end upon their senses that this airy charm is for, I’ll break my staff, bury it certain fathoms in the earth, and deeper than did ever plummet sound I’ll drown my book. (Solemn music)’ Ariel Come unto these yellow sands, And then take hands: Curtsied when you have, and kissed The wild waves whist, Foot it featly here, and there, and sweet sprites bear the burden. [Burden dispersedly, within] Hark, hark, bow wow: the watchdogs bark, bow wow. [Burden dispersedly, within] Hark, hark, I hear, the strain of strutting Chanticleer Cry cock-a-diddle-dow. Full fathom five thy father lies, Of his bones are coral made: Those are pearls that were his eyes, Nothing of him that doth fade, But doth suffer a sea change Into something rich and strange: Sea nymphs hourly ring his knell. [Burden: ding dong.] Hark now I hear them, ding dong bell. Caliban Be not afeard. The isle is full of noises, Sounds and sweet airs that give delight and hurt not. Sometimes a thousand twangling instruments Will hum about mine ears, and sometimes voices That, if I then had waked after long sleep, Will make me sleep again; and then, in dreaming, The clouds methought would open, and show riches Ready to drop upon me, that when I waked I cried to dream again. Prospero You elves of hills, brooks, standing lakes, and groves, And you that on the sands with printless foot Do chase the ebbing Neptune, and do fly him When he comes back; you demi-puppets that By moonshine do the green sour ringlets make, Whereof the ewe not bites; and you whose pastime Is to make midnight mushrumps, that rejoice To hear the solemn curfew; by whose aid, Weak masters though you be, I have bedimmed The noontide sun, called forth the mutinous winds, And ’twixt the green sea and the azured vault Set roaring war; to the dread rattling thunder Have I given fire, and rifted Jove’s stout oak With his own bolt; the strong-based promontory Have I made shake, and by the spurs plucked up The pine and cedar; graves at my command Have waked their sleepers, oped, and let ’em forth By my so potent art. But this rough magic I here abjure, and when I have required Some heavenly music, which even now I do, To work mine end upon their senses that This airy charm is for, I’ll break my staff, Bury it certain fathoms in the earth, And deeper than did ever plummet sound I’ll drown my book. (Solemn music) AEIOU (2009) - Judd Greenstein Judd Greenstein: ‘AEIOU was written at MASS MoCA in the summer of 2009, during the first-ever assemblage of Roomful of Teeth. I came up for the second week of their 2-week residency, not knowing what the group was capable of doing – a forgivable sin since the group itself was just beginning to learn their own abilities and capacities. With me, I brought some sketches that I felt could be adapted to whatever sounds I heard the singers produce; these were études of sorts, studies in rhythm and harmony that left a lot of room for different sounds in different places. Once I heard what the group was able to do, I adapted some of these with their varied techniques in mind, creating fully- formed pieces that combined my sketches with the sounds of the ensemble. AEIOU uses the five basic vowel sounds, in their Spanish configuration, as an ordered set, a “text” of sorts that structures the forward progress of the work, while the sonic landscape is a tapestry of interwoven yodels, throat singing, and straight-tone clarity. It’s an extremely challenging work and could only be performed by the singers of this incredible ensemble, to whom I give my deepest thanks.’ Partita for 8 Voices (2012) - Caroline Shaw Composed over three summers from 2009-2011, in collabo- ration with Roomful of Teeth during their residencies at the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art (MASS MoCA), Caroline Shaw’s Partita for 8 Voices was nominated for a Grammy for Best Contemporary Classical Composition and received the 2013 Pulitzer Prize in Music.