Monday Evening, December 11, 2017, at 7:30 The Juilliard School presents Juilliard Percussion Ensemble Daniel Druckman , Director Daniel Parker and Christopher Staknys , Piano Zlatomir Fung , Cello Bell and Drum: Percussion Music From China GUO WENJING (b. 1956) Parade (2003) SAE HASHIMOTO EVAN SADDLER DAVID YOON ZHOU LONG (b. 1953) Wu Ji (2006) CHRISTOPHER STAKNYS, Piano BENJAMIN CORNOVACA LEO SIMON LEI LIANG (b. 1972) Inkscape (2014) DANIEL PARKER, Piano TYLER CUNNINGHAM JAKE DARNELL OMAR EL-ABIDIN EUIJIN JUNG Intermission The taking of photographs and the use of recording equipment are not permitted in this auditorium. Information regarding gifts to the school may be obtained from the Juilliard School Development Office, 60 Lincoln Center Plaza, New York, NY 10023-6588; (212) 799-5000, ext. 278 (juilliard.edu/giving). Alice Tully Hall Please make certain that all electronic devices are turned off during the performance. CHOU WEN-CHUNG (b. 1923) Echoes From the Gorge (1989) Prelude: Exploring the modes Raindrops on Bamboo Leaves Echoes From the Gorge, Resonant and Free Autumn Pond Clear Moon Shadows in the Ravine Old Tree by the Cold Spring Sonorous Stones Droplets Down the Rocks Drifting Clouds Rolling Pearls Peaks and Cascades Falling Rocks and Flying Spray JOSEPH BRICKER TAYLOR HAMPTON HARRISON HONOR JOHN MARTIN THENELL TAN DUN (b. 1957) Elegy: Snow in June (1991) ZLATOMIR FUNG, Cello OMAR EL-ABIDIN BENJAMIN CORNOVACA TOBY GRACE LEO SIMON Performance time: Approximately 1 hour and 45 minutes, including one intermission Notes on the Program Scored for six Beijing opera gongs laid flat on a table, Parade is an exhilarating work by Jay Goodwin that amazes both with its sheer difficulty to perform and with the incredible array of dif - “In studying non-Western music, one ferent sounds that can be coaxed from must consider the character and tradition what would seem to be a monochromatic of its culture as well as all the inherent selection of instruments. Guo cleverly qualities of the material itself, not all of announces both of these aspects, explaining which are perceptible or definable accord - that the work’s Chinese title ( Xuan ) trans - ing to established Western concepts.” lates as both “glitter, as in shiny metals… —Chou Wen-chung and also display, as in performers showing off their talent.” With heroic feats of The music on this program—all written by choreography and musicianship, the piece Chinese-born composers, all but one of requires three percussionists to coordinate whom now live in the U.S.—illustrates both and interweave their movements as they the contrasting musical traditions of East and share the six instruments, which must be West and the increasing inspiration that each played with a variety of sticks and mallets has provided the other in recent decades. and manipulated and muffled by fingers Percussion is an especially appropriate and and hands. interesting medium for these points of con - trast and contact. It has played a hugely Wu Ji prominent part in Chinese music and the ZHOU LONG country’s social and religious culture for thou - Born in Beijing, China, on July 8, 1953 sands of years, yet it has been an underuti - lized resource in Western music for most of Zhou Long moved to the U.S. in 1985 on a its history. But in the last several decades, fellowship to Columbia University, where percussion has become a foundational and he studied with, among others, Chou Wen- transformational means of expression for chung. As with Chou, Zhou’s relocation to modern Western composers—due in no the West provided inspiration by means of small part to Eastern influences—and has led the juxtaposition of and cross-pollination to the discovery and exploration of a whole between his native musical culture and new world of sonic possibilities. that of his new home. “For every genera - tion, traditional culture is something already Parade formed,” Zhou has written. “What is cru - GUO WENJING cial is how to rediscover and comprehend Born in Chongqing, China, it more fully. … Artists of one culture or tra - on February 1, 1956 dition can also choose to absorb or extract the essence of various other cultures in Guo Wenjing is the only one of the com - the service of a lasting tradition. Such has posers featured on this program to have been my goal—to bring Western music lived most of his life in his native China. theory concepts into my music, which is Among the first students (along with Zhou always the result of my Chinese heritage.” Long and Tan Dun) to attend Beijing’s Central Conservatory after it reopened in Wu Ji takes its title from ancient Chinese 1978 following the Cultural Revolution, philosophy: Wu , meaning “the lack of” or Guo went on to teach there and eventually “beyond,” and Ji , meaning “infinity” or the head the school’s composition department; boundless expanse of the universe that he remains on the faculty to this day. exceeds all time and space—so, all together, “beyond infinity.” A free-ranging work, there does often seem to be a sense set of variations that uses an extremely of the piano initiating musical gestures and broad palette of pitches and timbral shad - the percussionists evoking the sonic ings to evoke this unmeasurable vastness, “mark” that is left behind. The wide con - Wu Ji began its life as a work for piano and trasts of dynamics, sometimes lengthy tape in 1987. It was adapted for piano, silences, and fluid movement between furi - zheng, and percussion in 1991, and finally ous energy and impressionistic brushes of evolved into the present version for piano ambient sound, make for fascinating music, and two percussionists in 2002. both captivating to the ear and theatrical to the eye. Inkscape LEI LIANG Echoes From the Gorge Born in Tianjin, China, on November 28, CHOU WEN-CHUNG 1972 Born in Yantai, China, on June 29, 1923 Lei Liang began training as a pianist and An elder statesman of Chinese musicians composer very early—age four for the for - in America, Chou Wen-chung moved to mer and age six for the latter—and quickly the U.S. in 1946, already educated as a achieved success in both disciplines, win - civil engineer, to study architecture at Yale ning several distinguished Chinese compo - on scholarship. His longstanding passion sition and piano competitions. In 1990, for music intervened, however, and Chou while still a teenager, he emigrated to the instead ended up attending New England U.S., continuing his music education first Conservatory, studying composition with in Texas and then at New England Nicolas Slonimsky, among others. In 1949 Conservatory (bachelor’s and master’s he moved to New York, where he took degrees) and Harvard (Ph.D.), where his classes at Columbia and private lessons mentors included Harrison Birtwistle and with Edgard Varèse, who became one of Mario Davidovsky, among several other his most important influences and to notable composers. Since 2007 he has whom he became a longtime and trusted been a faculty member at the University of assistant. He eventually joined the faculty California, San Diego. at Columbia and ultimately served more than ten years as the dean of its school of Like Zhou Long, Lei in many ways follows the arts and two decades as the chairman in the footsteps of Chou Wen-chung—in of its doctoral composition program. the case of Inkscape , a 2014 work for per - cussion quartet and piano, the connection “The West, in its preoccupation with poly - lies in the exploration of the aesthetic links phonic writing,” Chou has observed, “has between music and traditional Chinese cal - more or less forsaken those particular ligraphy and painting, a concept that has aspects in music of which the East has also resulted in several of Chou’s works. remained master,” but he notes that in “In traditional Asian ink paintings,” Lei recent years, Western composers “have writes in a note about the piece, “we often begun exploring the immense resources in discuss two complementary aspects: musical expression afforded by controlling brush and ink. Piano, in this composition, and varying the articulation, timbre, and serves as the ‘brush,’ and the percussion intensity of individual tones—precisely the quartet, the ‘ink.’” And though it doesn’t same resources that have been of primary pay to concentrate overmuch on connect - importance to Eastern music.” Throughout ing this metaphor to the sound of the his life Chou has dedicated himself to exploring what he calls the “confluence” Tiananmen Square massacre of 1989. But of these different musical cultures by afford - the inspiration for its evocative title speaks ing their priorities and concerns equal weight to its more universal message even as it in his compositions. reveals strong links to its Chinese origins. The composer—who grew up in Hunan, Echoes From the Gorge , written in 1989 for attended Beijing’s Central Conservatory a quartet of percussionists, is Chou’s self- after the Cultural Revolution, and perma - proclaimed magnum opus, representing “a nently relocated in 1986 to New York City, summation of all the concepts, East and where he spent time studying with Chou West,” that the composer assimilated over Wen-chung—explains: “The image of the course of his career to that point. ‘Snow in June’ comes from a 13th-cen tury Divided into an introduction and 12 sec - Chinese drama by Kuan Han-Ching, in tions that are given evocative, nature- which a young woman, Dou Eh, is exe - inspired titles— Autumn Pond , Sonorous cuted for crimes she did not commit. Stones , Raindrops on Bamboo Leaves , Even nature cries out at this injustice: Her etc.—Chou calls for dozens of very specifi - blood does not fall to earth but flies cally codified instruments and performance upward, a heavy snow falls in June, and a techniques to achieve a vast but extremely drought descends for three years.