May 2, 2019 Program Notes: Anna Clyne

Anna Clyne of music as “a naked woman include the symphonic ballet RIFT a key role in the piece’s inspiration: running mad through the pure and The Seamstress, a violin concerto the composer refers to two specific Born March 9, 1980, in London; night.” for Jennifer Koh, which Clyne poems, each containing powerful currently resides in Brooklyn, New composed as “an imaginary one- nocturnal imagery. The first is by the York act ballet” inspired by a William Nobel Prize-winning Juan Ramón nna Clyne’s position as Butler Yeats poem. Jiménez (1881-1958): La musica;—mujer This Midnight Hour composer-in-residence A desnuda/corriendo loca por la noche pura! through the Music Alive program The London-born Clyne has lived Composed: 2015 (“Music;—a naked woman/running is coming to its end after three in the United States since 2002, First performance: November mad through the pure night!”). The seasons. In the process, Berkeley having studied at the University 13, 2015, with Enrique Mazzola second is one of the best-known poems Symphony audiences have come of Edinburgh and the Manhattan conducting the Orchestre national from Charles Baudelaire’s (1821-1867) to experience Clyne’s commitment School of Music, where 2019 Pulitzer d’Île de France in Plaisir, France Fleurs du Mal (“Flowers of Evil”), the to collaborative creativity in Prize winner Julia Wolfe became highly musical Harmonie du soir: Duration: approximately 12 her artistic practice—and the an important mentor. Clyne’s minutes innovative spirit this has fostered. music has been featured at the Voici venir les temps où vibrant sur sa tige Her music characteristically seeks BBC Proms, and her double violin Chaque fleur s’évapore ainsi qu’un encensoir; This Midnight Hour is scored for out connections with the visual concerto Prince of Clouds, which Les sons et les parfums tournent dans l’air du soir; 2 flutes and piccolo, 2 oboes, 2 arts, poetry, and dance. Last she wrote during her Chicago Valse mélancolique et langoureux vertige! clarinets, 2 bassoons, 4 horns, fall, for example, the Symphony residency, was nominated for Chaque fleur s’évapore ainsi qu’un encensoir; 2 trumpets, 3 trombones, tuba, opened the season with Night Ferry, a Best Contemporary Classical Le violon frémit comme un coeur qu’on afflige; timpani, 2 percussionists, and a milestone in her orchestral work Composition Grammy Award in Valse mélancolique et langoureux vertige! strings. to date that addresses issues of 2015. The position at Berkeley is Le ciel est triste et beau comme un grand reposoir. manic depression and its effects the latest in a series of prestigious In sum: Le violon frémit comme un coeur qu’on afflige, on creative artists. Her process residencies for Clyne, including Un coeur tendre, qui hait le néant vaste et noir! • Anna Clyne completes her of composing involved a graphic with the Chicago Symphony (2012- Le ciel est triste et beau comme un grand reposoir; three-year tenure as Music Alive score that included a multi-panel 15), the Orchestre national d’Île de Le soleil s’est noyé dans son sang qui se fige. Composer-in-Residence with painting she had made of images France (2014-16), from 2014-16; the Berkeley Symphony with this new and textual fragments to guide her Baltimore Symphony (2015-16), and Un coeur tendre, qui hait le néant vaste et noir, collaboration with KT Nelson and Du passé lumineux recueille tout vestige! work on the music. National Sawdust (2017-18). ODC/Dance Le soleil s’est noyé dans son sang qui se fige . . . For this evening’s work, This Co-commissioned by the Orchestre Ton souvenir en moi luit comme un ostensoir! • This Midnight Hour was inspired Midnight Hour, Clyne revisits a score national d’Île de France and Seattle by the nocturnal and musical What to listen for from 2015 together with ODC/ Symphony, This Midnight Hour is imagery from two poems. Dance, whose Co-Artistic Director a single-movement work whose In addition to the nocturnal images • Clyne juxtaposes slightly surreal KT Nelson has choreographed the relatively brief duration belies the of the Jiménez and Baudelaire poems, distortions of the waltz with thick music. Clyne’s fascination with sense of event and encompassing Clyne notes the inspiration she found textures and agitated rhythms, dance is a recurrent thread in her phantasmagoria Clyne achieves in the darker low string sounds of the evoking one of the poem’s images compositions. Other examples in her score. Poetry again plays Orchestre national d’Île de France when

May 2, 2019 May 2, 2019 she collaborated with that ensemble. section into many-layered strands. It is with this sonority that This Jiménez’ imagistic symbol of music Midnight Hour begins. Without as a “mad woman” is depicted by intending to suggest a specific “fast, accelerating rhythms with programmatic narrative, Clyne dense textures in the orchestra.” explains, the title is meant to evoke Overall, according to the composer, a “mysterious journey of a woman, the character of This Midnight Hour compressed into a single hour.” ranges from a “playful to more The poetic sources find their way ominous” soundscape and from into Clyne’s music in various ways. chamber music-like solo passages Baudelaire’s Valse mélancolique et to full ensemble writing. Thanks langoureux vertige (“melancholy waltz to Clyne’s deft combination of and languid vertigo”) prompts a imagination and craft, the result is “slightly warped version of a waltz,” like watching a super-compressed Clyne says, using folklike melodic film—or like seeing a lifetime flashing material. At times, she manipulates before a dying person’s eyes. The end her orchestration to make the comes as a surprise, in the inner of ensemble mimic the sound of an Brian De Palma. accordion via changes in the strings’ tuning. Dividing up the large string —© 2019 Thomas May

May 2, 2019 May 2, 2019