Iridescent
We live in a world of color. Many of us have a favorite, or two or three in combination, to which we cling because they seem to represent our personalities and affect. Composers have long known this, and have used it to their advantage throughout modern history. As they seek to infuse their music with a sense of richness of hue, the listener finds that each composer's take on color produces a unique palate, a distinct version. This is the idea of iridescence found in music - colors that change when we look at them from a new angle. Iridescent brings together five works, one world premiere among them, that harness these rich colors and shed light in different wavelengths for a sonic experience as varied as the spectrum of light itself.
Read about each piece below and feel free to click on the composer photos to read more about them.
Rojo en Azul Volátil
Diana Syrse
"Rojo en Azul Volatil is inspired in the paintings of the Mexican artist Rufino Tamayo.
Each fragment represents a different color frequently used by the artist in his paintings like mysterious blue or sarcastic red. The themes are combined, creating new colors - for example, the yellow theme of the clarinet is combined with the blue theme of the flute creating a "playing green."
Some of the indications for the performers in the score have the names of the paintings. This is in order to give them a suggestion of what the composer was imagining or what had been the inspiration of a certain fragment while composing the music. The idea was also conceived in order to give the performers the opportunity of making their own interpretation of colors and characters in the music and contribute to the sonorous paintings.
Program note by Diana Syrse
Azul
Nathan Daughtrey
The title, Azul is simply Spanish for the color “blue.” The two movements represent two opposing incarnations of the color blue. The first movement, "Cerulean Ice," features only metallic keyboard percussion and begins with fairly harshly struck unison 5ths in the crotales and vibraphone. The contemplative mood is meant to suggest the vast icy-blue glaciers of Antarctica. The second movement, "Sapphiric Fire," utilizes only the marimba with the flute. The “infernal” tempo and constantly shifting meters/pulses represents the unpredictability of the element fire. It functions much like a rondo, insistently returning to the opening motivic materials, while also bringing in some elements from the first movement.
Also providing shaped and context for the work is the short, dark poem by Robert Frost:
"Fire & Ice"
Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I’ve tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.
"Azul" was commissioned by the Apollo Duo (Stefanie Abderhalden, flute and Jeremy Johnston, percussion).
Program note by Nathan Daughtery
Tourmaline (WORLD PREMIERE)
Hilary Purrington
Dark Jewel Tones (commissioned by Catchfire Collective)
Peter Swanson
Dark Jewel Tones was written for Catchfire Collective for its 2021-22 season opening concerts. The piece very loosely explores implications of the meaning behind the five jewel tones: Ruby, Emerald, Amethyst, Sapphire, and Citrine.
Program note by Peter Swanson
Blueshift
Alex Freeman
The title of this single-movement work comes from the term in astronomy used to describe the phenomenon in which the frequency of an electromagnetic wave emitted by a celestial object that is moving toward an observer shifts toward the blue side of the electromagnetic spectrum. It is somewhat akin to the Doppler effect as it would apply to light. Its opposite, redshift, is regarded as evidence of an expanding universe - objects moving away and outward exhibit this.
The basic concepts of shortening wavelengths and contraction of material, as opposed to say, expansion, are applied to this composition. But the very sound of the word "blueshift", which I like very much to say, and the notion of light from remote celestial objects on a journey across the universe toward us would probably speak better to the ambiance of the work (but there is not program or story implied). It progresses in one continuous movement from more nebulous textures to cleared, bright, more transparent music.
Program note by Alex Freeman