Gcmf Program Notes Aug 31.Pdf

Grand Canyon Music Festival The 30th Anniversary Season Program Notes for Saturday, August 31, 2013 Osvaldo Golijov Tenebrae Born in Argentina to an Eastern European Jewish family, Osvaldo Golijov (b.1960) was raised in a musical home. Classical, klezmer, and liturgical music from the Jewish tradition, as well the new tango of Astor Piazzolla, all melded together to form the young composer’s palate of sounds. After moving to Israel to study, Golijov came to the United States, where he earned his Ph.D. at the University of Pennsylvania. His earliest mature works were written for the St. Lawrence and Kronos String Quartets. His style has been described as “volatile” and “category-defying,” and recordings of his work have won several Grammy and Latin Grammy awards. The composer describes Tenebrae as “an orbiting spaceship that never touches the ground.” Its inspiration comes from two experiences in Golijov’s life in September 2000: a trip to Israel, at the start of renewed violence there, followed by a visit to the Hayden Planetarium with his son. Tenebrae is a study of conflict between the big-picture serenity of earth viewed from space, and the close-up reality of pain and discord that troubles so much of the world. Igor Stravinsky Three Pieces for String Quartet Igor Stravinsky (1882 – 1971) is one of the most celebrated composers of the 20th century. His varied life and career included citizenship in three countries, as well as three distinct stylistic periods in his composition. As a young man in Russia, Stravinsky was drawn to that countries’ rich tradition of folk literature, art, and music, and much of his early compositions reflect this affinity. His love of this material was so great that he returned to Russia days before the outbreak of World War I to retrieve his personal collections and compilations of Russian folk music. His formal studies took place under the personal tutelage of Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, after which he became the composer for Sergei Diaghilev, theater impresario of the Ballet Russes. He moved with his wife and children to Switzerland, and then to France, finally settling in America in 1939. The Three Pieces for String Quartet were first composed during his Russian period of composition, and a folk melody is featured in the first piece. They were revised over time until 1928, when they were premiered with an additional movment as Quatre études. Andy Teirstein Restless Nation A celebrated and eclectic composer of classical music, Andy Teirstein (b. 1957) has also performed as a clown, an actor, and a multimedia performance artist. Rooted in the folk traditions that run throughout modern culture, his music is heavily influenced by, and often accompanies, dance and music theater performances. He is an active collector of folk music from around the world, and learned fiddle tunes in the pubs of Ireland, studied with Hopi and Cheyenne Indians, and performed as a singing clown in a Mexican circus. In 2008, Teirstein went on a year-long home-schooling trip across the country with his wife, son, and daughter, who were 8 and 13 at the time. He describes their expedition as the educational opportunity of a lifetime: “The children were able to observe the geological history, biosphere and natural resources of each area they visited. They learned the constellations from sleeping out under the stars. They trekked into Canyon de Chelley to view Anasazi petroglyphs and visited the Hopi in Arizona. “Restless Nation” is a musical evocation of the children’s perspective.” His son’s quote when hiking Bryce Canyon sums it up beautifully: “My eyes were hungry…and I didn’t know it.” Philip Glass String Quartet No. 3 “Mishima” There are some composers who inspire extremes of opinion. Philip Glass (b. 1937) is one of them. Although he is one of the most influential composers of our time, his music is often controversially described as “minimalist,” a term that turns off many would-be audience members. Glass himself is wary of genre, and his prolific output runs the gamut from silence to opera and symphony. Born in Baltimore, the composer’s early musical influences came in the form of unsold records from his father’s store – Hindemith, Schoenberg, and other modern composers. He studied at Peabody, the University of Chicago, Juilliard, and Aspen, after which he moved to France to work with the legendary Nadia Boulanger. He often draws on modern technology and its accompanying din, eastern music and philosophy, and the visual arts for musical material. The work you will hear this evening was written to accompany a section of Paul Schrader’s “Mishima,” a film about the Japanese novelist broken into three sections. The writer’s childhood was filmed in black and white, and scored by Glass; the resulting work is the String Quartet No. 3. Program Notes by Cabiria Jacobsen.

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