Rouse Program Notes

04-17 Americans:Layout 1 4/10/13 11:53 AM Page 25 Notes on the Program By James M. Keller, Program Annotator The Leni and Peter May Chair Prospero’s Rooms by the Orchestra and Principal Trombone Joseph Alessi. In that same year Rouse was Christopher Rouse honored with an American Academy of Arts and Letters Award in Music, and in 2002 the Christopher Rouse, who this season is fulfilling Academy elected him to its membership. Also the first of two years as The Marie-Josée Kravis in 2002, Rouse’s Concert de Gaudí, a guitar Composer-in-Residence at the New York Phil- concerto, won the Grammy Award for Best harmonic, is among the most respected com- Classical Contemporary Composition. He was posers of his generation, noted for works of named Musician of the Year (2009) by Musi- compulsive rhythm, vivid color, and catholicity in cal America, which particularly noted his skill bringing together the traditions of classical and as a composer of symphonic scores. He has popular music. He graduated from the Oberlin served as composer-in-residence for the In- College Conservatory of Music in 1971, and 25 dianapolis, Baltimore, and Pittsburgh sym- years later his alma mater also awarded him an phony orchestras, as well as at the Santa honorary doctorate. He studied privately with Cecilia and Schleswig-Holstein Festivals (both George Crumb for two years and then pursued of these at the invitation of Leonard Bern- composition studies with Karel Husa and stein), the Tanglewood festival, Pacific Music Robert Palmer at Cornell University, which Festival, and the Aspen Music Festival. granted him a doctoral degree in 1977. Also in- Although he has written in many genres, fluential was the composer William Schuman, Rouse is most widely recognized as an or- past president of The Juilliard School and a chestral composer. His music has been pro- founder of Lincoln Center. grammed by every major American orchestra Rouse went on to teach at the University of in addition to many of the principal orchestras Michigan, the Eastman School of Music, and of Europe, Australia, and Asia. Among his The Juilliard School (where he has taught recent works are Odna Zhizn, a New York since 1997, full-time since 2002). In 1988 he received In Short the Kennedy Center Fried- heim Award for his Sym- Born: February 15, 1949, in Baltimore, Maryland phony No. 1, and in 1993 Resides: in Baltimore he was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Music for his Trom- Work composed: 2012, on commission from the New York Philharmonic; bone Concerto, one of the completed on August 13 of that year in Baltimore, Maryland New York Philharmonic’s World premiere: these performances 150th Anniversary Commis- sions, which was premiered Estimated duration: ca. 10 minutes April 2013 25 04-17 Americans:Layout 1 4/10/13 11:53 AM Page 26 Philharmonic commission that Alan Gilbert the countryside. He commands that there conducted in its world premiere in 2010; be a ball — the “masque” — but that no one Symphony No. 3, which the St. Louis Sym- is to wear red. But of course a figure clad phony premiered in 2011; and Heimdall’s all in red does appear; it is the Red Death, Trumpet, a concerto for trumpet and orches- and it claims the lives of all in the castle. tra premiered this past December by the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. In connection Before the guests die, however, it is revealed with his New York Philharmonic appointment that the stranger is in fact incorporeal, that the Orchestra has also performed Rouse’s nothing exists beneath his cloak. The mean- Phantasmata, an orchestral triptych, and in ing of this story and its central figures has June it will give the New York premiere of his been argued, but all that is certain is the fi- Symphony No. 3. nality of the Red Death. Poe’s tale concludes: His new work, Prospero’s Rooms, is in- “And Darkness and Decay and the Red spired not by Shakespeare’s The Tempest, Death held illimitable dominion over all.” but by a different literary source: Edgar Allan Poe’s short story “The Masque of the Red Instrumentation: two flutes and piccolo, Death,” first published in 1842. Rouse offers two oboes and English horn, two clarinets and this summarization: bass clarinet, two bassoons and contrabas- soon, four horns, three trumpets, three trom- The story concerns a vain prince, Prospero, bones, tuba, timpani, bell plate, gong, snare who summons his friends to his palace and drum, triangles, tam-tams, bass drum, orches- locks them in so that they will remain safe tra bells, football ratchet, crash, Chinese and from the Red Death, a plague that is ravaging suspended cymbals, harp, and strings. In the Composer’s Words In the days when I would have still contemplated composing an opera, my preferred source was Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Masque of the Red Death.” A marvelous story full of both symbolism and terror. … How- ever, I shall not be composing an opera, and so I decided to redirect my ideas into what might be consid- ered an overture to an unwritten opera. In the castle are a series of rooms, each of which is entirely in one color: blue, purple, green, orange, white, violet. The last is the black room, but the window is blood red rather than black. In the corner is an enormous ebony clock, and whenever it tolls the hour, everyone in the castle hears it and is frozen with terror. Of course, there are 12 strokes of the clock. My piece is a journey through those seven rooms. I don’t have synesthe- sia, which is an actual sensation of the connection between color and mu- sical notes, but I’ve tried to imagine what these colors would sound like. The most important thing for me was getting the sound of the clock chiming. I spent a few hours one afternoon with Chris Lamb, the Philharmonic’s Prin- cipal Percussionist, down in the bowels of Avery Fisher Hall, going through some of the percussion instruments that they have. We came up with a com- posite sound, not just one instrument but actually a very large, tuned gong, an equally large tuned bell plate, and an enormous tam-tam that are all Harry Clarke’s illustration for “The Masque of the Red struck together to create the sound of the clock striking. You hear it 12 times, Death,” from 1919 spread out through the piece. 26 New York Philharmonic.

Load more