• Abstract and Figures
• Public Full-text

Orchestra Series University Symphony Orchestra Student Showcase Tuesday, April 11, 2017 at 8pm Lagerquist Concert Hall, Mary Baker Russell Music Center Pacific Lutheran University School of Arts and Communication and The Department of Music present Orchestra Series University Symphony Orchestra Jeffrey Bell-Hanson, conductor Student Showcase Featuring Sarah Martin, mezzo-soprano Katherine Nakasone, flute Torsen Necessary, flute Elliott Turner, composer Tuesday, April 11, 2017 at 8pm Lagerquist Concert Hall, Mary Baker Russell Music Center Welcome to Lagerquist Concert Hall. Please disable the audible signal on all watches, pagers and cellular phones for the duration of the performance. Use of cameras, recording equipment and all electronic devices is not permitted in the concert hall. PROGRAM Spiritus Mundi ................................................................................................................................ Elliott Turner (b. 1995) World Premiere Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen ..............................................................................................Gustav Mahler (1860-1911) 1. Wenn mein Schatz Hochzeit macht 2. Ging heut’ Morgen über’s Feld 3. Ich hab’ ein glühend Messer 4. Die zwei blauen Augen Sarah Martin, mezzo soprano Hungarian Pastoral Fantasy ........................................................................................ Albert Franz Doppler (1821-1883) Katherine Nakasone, flute Intermission Concerto No. 1 in G Major for Flute, K. 313 .................................................... Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791) Adagio ma non troppo Rondo: Tempo di Menuetto Torsen Necesary, flute Adagio for String Orchestra ........................................................................................................... Cindy McTee (b. 1953) Awakening ...................................................................................................................................... Joseph Curiale (b. 1955) Compassion Forgiveness Joy Guest Performers from the Eatonville High School Band, Jon Stein Director: Kyla Ames, flute; Kylie Kondra, flute; Lauryn Harvey, clarinet Program Notes Composer, Elliott Turner writes the following about his new work, Spiritus Mundi: The piece was initially conceived as an intersection between the musical worlds of jazz and classical music, and for this reason the groove of the piece is integral to its portrayal. This groove mainly comes from an ostinato bassline that continues throughout, and its interaction with the 11/8 pattern and the 3/8 pattern which first creep in early in the piece, coupled with the jazz ride which comes in at various places in the piece. Another important structural component that I would point out is that the vibraphone’s metallic, bright sound and its theme contrast with the marimba’s mellow, woody sound and theme later on; and that this contrast is what drives a lot of the piece similar to how the literary themes “city” and “pastoral/rural” are contrasted. Gustav Mahler’s song cycle, Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen, is a youthful work written when he was in his mid-twenties. The texts were selected from a collection of six poems by the composer, written during a love affair with Johanna Richter. The imagery, along with the implied central character of the wayfarer, are rooted in the pastoral world of German romanticism. They all explore the juxtaposition of love and the pain that so often accompanies it. The music of these songs would subsequently form much of the substance in the composer’s first symphony. Translations: When My Sweetheart Has Her Wedding I Have a Glowing Knife When my sweetheart has her wedding, I have a glowing knife, a knife in my breast, alas! alas! Has her joyful wedding, It cuts so deep into every joy and every delight, so deep, so I will have my wretched day! deep! I’ll go to my little room, gloomy little room! Ah, what an evil guest it is! I’ll weep! I’ll weep! For my sweetheart, It never keeps still, it never rests, neither by day nor by night For my beloved sweetheart! when I would sleep! Alas! Alas! Alas! Little blue flower! Little blue flower! When I look up to heaven, I see two blue eyes there! Alas! Wither not! Wither not! Alas! Sweet little bird! Sweet little bird! I walk in the yellow field, I see from afar the blonde hair You sing on the green heath! blowing in the wind! Alas! Alas! Ah! The world is so lovely! When I awake from the dream and hear her silver laughter Chirrup! Chirrup! Sing not! Blossom not! ringing, alas! alas! Spring is truly past! All singing is now done! I wish that I were lying on the black bier, and could never, Evenings when I go to bed, I think on my pain! never open my eyes! I Went Out This Morning Over the Countryside The Two Blue Eyes I went out this morning over the countryside, dew still hung The two blue eyes of my sweetheart have sent me into the from the grass; the merry finch spoke to me: wide world. So I had to take leave of the dearest place! “Oh, it’s you, is it? Good morning! Is it not a lovely world? O eyes, blue! Why did you look at me? Chirp! Chirp! Pretty and Lively! How the world delights me!” Now I have eternal pain and sorrow! The bluebells in the meadow also rang merrily and cheerfully I went out in the still night, over the gloomy heath. for me with their little bells, ring-a-ring, rang their morning No one said farewell to me, Farewell! Farewell! Farewell! greeting: “Is it not a lovely world!? Ring, ring! Pretty thing! My companion was love and sorrow! How the world delights me! Ho!” On the highway stood a linden tree, there for the first time did And then in the sunshine the world at once began to sparkle, I rest in sleep! everything, everything took on sound and color in the Under the linden tree, which snowed its blossoms down on me, sunshine! There I knew not how life goes, everything was fine again, ah, Flower and bird, the large and the small! everything was fine again! “Good day! Lovely world!” Now surely my happiness also Love and pain! And world and dream begins?! No! No! What I love can never bloom for me! Albert Franz Doppler was a member of a successful family of musicians. His father was the well-known oboist Joseph Doppler. However it was his brother, Karl, also a virtuoso flutist, with whom he toured Europe multiple times concertizing and building his fame. He spent the early part of his career as a flutist in theatrical orchestras in Pest. While there he wrote a number of successful operas for the state opera theater on Hungarian themes. This success no doubt helped to cement his embrace of the Hungarian folk idiom that suffuses this work. The Hungarian Pastoral Fantasy was originally written for two flutes and piano, almost certainly for the two brothers to play. It was later reworked for one flute by the composer, and has been orchestrated multiple times, here by A. Klautzsch. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Concerto No. 1 for Flute in G Major, K. 313 was composed in 1778 during a stay in Paris that proved to be fateful for the composer and his entire family. During the summer months his mother, who was travelling with him, was taken ill and died in early July. His father, Leopold, who had stayed behind in Salzburg for financial reasons (both father and son had been released from Archbishop Colloredo’s employ at the court earlier that year) was beside himself with grief, and responded to the news with letters that seemed to have blamed Wolfgang for this tragic turn. While the flute concerto was likely written late in the year, the music betrays little sign of this personal turmoil. Nonetheless, the second movement, with which this performance begins, is filled with tenderness, and the Rondo of the third movement is unusual for its slow, danceable minuet tempo. Cindy McTee writes about her Adagio for String Orchestra: Adapted from my Agnus Dei for organ in the wake of events following the horror of September 11, 2001, the Adagio became the second movement of my Symphony No. 1: Ballet for Orchestra. It was commissioned by the National Symphony Orchestra - music director, Leonard Slatkin - and made possible by the John and June Hechinger Fund for New Orchestra Works. The Adagio gradually exposes a hauntingly beautiful melody from Krzysztof Penderecki's Polish Requiem (Ab, G, F, C, Db, Eb, Db, C). A falling half-step and subsequent whole-step emphasize the interval of the minor third. With occasional references to Samuel Barber's Adagio for Strings, the work's harmonic language reflects my interest in using both atonal and tonal materials within the same piece of music. All night have the roses heard The flute, violin, bassoon; All night has the casement jessamine stirr'd To the dancers dancing in tune; Till a silence fell with the waking bird, And a hush with the setting moon. ---- Alfred Lord Tennyson, Maud, and Other Poems Whether or not you recognize his name, at least some of Joseph Curiale’s music is likely familiar to you. He began a successful career as a film and television composer on the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson in 1982. His “Sick of the Blues” became the show’s closing theme. He went on to compose music for many movies and television programs, including Roxanne, Little Nikita, and Ace Ventura, Pet Detective. He turned to concert music in the 1990s, and released his first compact disc recording with the London Symphony in 1995, of which Awakening is the title work. Cast in three short movements, it traces a path of emotional and spiritual awakening not unlike one that the composer describes having experienced. Like much of his concert music, it possesses a bold expansive character often associated with American music melded with elements of Asian musical culture. The composer’s comments about his own spiritual awakening give context to this unity of elements and to the seeming simplicity of the music: The simple things seem to have the greatest power yet are so easy to miss.

Load more

  8

Copy Link