Download Picture Ray ProgramAlt - Gotham Early Music Scene

PARTHENIA
Beverly Au, treble and bass viols
Lawrence Lipnik, tenor viol
Rosamund Morley, bass viol
Lisa Terry, bass viol
with
Barbara Feldon, actor
Paul Hecht, actor
Kristin Norderval, soprano
Hot off the press!
Poetry and new music
Two Sonnets
Torquato Tasso (1544-1595)
On the Death of Two Most Notable Lovers
On the Same Subject
I die, alas! (Moro lasso) Carlo Gesualdo (c. 1560-1613)
Night Voices No. 15 Max Lifchitz (2008)
Quartet for four viols
Let Evening Come Jane Kenyon (1947-1995)
2:4 David Thompson (2008)
Fantasy for four viols
Cicada
Fantazy
Anacreon (570-478 BC)
David Glaser (2008)
Duet for tenor and bass viols
He Bids His Beloved Be at Peace William Butler Yeats (1865-1939)
Like the Lily Frances White (1999, arr. for Parthenia 2008)
Two bass viols and electronic sound
Brief Pause
The Loathly Lady (act 2, scene 2; Sheherezade) Wendy Steiner (2006)
A Twelvemonth and a Day Paul Richards (2007)
Quartet for four viols
Nothing Proved
Kristin Norderval (2008)
Voice, viols and electronics
Nothing Proved
spoken: Quote by Elizabeth at the execution of Lord High Admiral Thomas Seymour,
condemned as a traitor, and accused, among other things, of plotting to marry the
princess Elizabeth "by secret and crafty means".
The Doubt
Spoken: Written in her French Psalter - Queen Elizabeth I (1533-1603)
Sung: The Doubt of Future Foes - Queen Elizabeth I
Grieve and Dare Not
Spoken: When I was fair and young – Queen Elizabeth I
"Madam, ye need not tell me" - Sir James Melville (1535-1617)
Sung: On Monsieur's Departure – Queen Elizabeth I
Composers will introduce each work and the audience is invited to stay after the performance for a Q & A
Picture Ray Studio
8 p.m. Wednesday, March 5, 2008
ABOUT THE PROGRAM
The viol consort PARTHENIA, with actors BARBARA FELDON and PAUL HECHT, and soprano
KRISTIN NORDERVAL, offer this unusual program of new musical selections “HOT OFF THE
PRESS,” composed or arranged this year for Parthenia by Max Lufchitz, Kristin Norderval, Paul
Richards, Frances White, David Glaser, and David Thompson.
Written especially for this evening’s program, Night Voices No. 15 is built around the unusual harmonies
found in the madrigal Moro lasso al mio duolo (I die, alas! From my pain) by Carlo Gesualdo (ca. 15601613). The Prince of Venosa, Gesualdo achieved notoriety for having murdered his wife Donna Maria de
Avalos and her lover Fabrizio Carafa upon catching them in flagrante delicto. Exempt from prosecution
given his high ranking social status, musicologists speculate that Gesualdo’s shocking and innovative
harmonic language was a response to the guilt feelings that tormented him throughout his life as a result
of his barbaric actions. The musical texture of Night Voices No. 15 juxtaposes post-modern techniques
with harmonic gestures derived from Gesualdo’s madrigal. These diverse elements wander into the
musical mist as if appearing through a dream-like mist.
The two pieces I have written for Parthenia (actually all my work up to now) share two commonalities:
A polyphonic musical texture and the use of ratios as a constructive device. Polyphonic musical texture is
just a fancy way we musicians mean to say music that has two or more independent musical lines
occurring at the same time in a piece. This style of composition focuses on the horizontal or liniar aspect
of music and has a vast and rich history in Western art music, especially so, for the consort of viols. 2:4
is a Fantasia and is inspired by the 16th century Italian Fantasia, which unlike its later incarnations was
quite formal and used mostly imitative counterpoint. In this work I have employed a canon by
augmentation, in which the imitating voice has the melody in doubled note values (twice as long) thus the
name 2:4. As the piece begins you will hear the canon theme played alone on the 2nd bass viol after
which, the second voice is introduced (1 st bass viol) this time the canon is played in augmentation while
the tenor viols plays the original canon theme. Other different voices are introduced but throughout the
piece the two canon themes are always present. In the second piece titled 3:4 my inspiration has come
from the Baroque da capo aria. Although the musical texture is choral the four voices are quite
independent from one another. The treble and tenor lines move in sets of 3 measures while the two basses
move in sets of 4 measures.
Written for Rosamund Morley and Lawrence Lipnik, Fantazy is a duo for tenor and bass viols. It is
based on the English viol fantasy and like its model, it too is organized in several contrasting sections. As
with the earlier fantasy some of these sections are contrapuntal, but unlike its Elizabethan forerunners
other sections are explorations of textural and timbral effects for the gamba.
Frances White Like the lily, originally for viola, double bass, and electronic sound (1999). In a special
arrangement for Parthenia. Like the lily was inspired by Alleluia: Justus germinabit, one of the chants
from the Liber Usualis. According to the Catholic church, these chants were dictated by God to Pope
Gregory the Great. The electronic part features quiet, indistinct, irregularly pulsing chords. Meanwhile,
in the strings, the chant surfaces in bits and pieces but is mostly not recognizable. At the end it finally
emerges from a fading sonic landscape made up of the sound of wind, tuned to form a harmonic
background to the chant.
A Twelvemonth and a Day was composed for Parthenia, both as a concert piece and as the prelude to the
third act of my new opera, The Loathly Lady. Written to Wendy Steiner’s libretto, it is based on "The
Wife of Bath's Tale" by Geoffrey Chaucer, in which a rakish knight has a year and a day to answer the
question, "What do women want most?" Since on his quest, The Loathly Lady’s Knight encounters
Titania, Freud, Sheherezade, Virginia Woolf, and other opinionated characters, John DeLucia’s musical
concept calls for them to be mirrored in appropriate period idioms and instruments, including viols. In
Picture Ray Studio
8 p.m. Wednesday, March 5, 2008
"A Twelvemonth and a Day," we hear the Knight leaving the frenetic dissonance of his travels for the
suspended medieval court of Camelot. The Loathly Lady has provided him with the correct answer, but
he is unaware of the elfin magic awaiting him and the final lesson he has in store. “The Loathly Lady”
will have its première in April, 2009 in concert performances in Philadelphia and elsewhere, featuring
Parthenia, Susan Hellauer, Jacqueline Horner, Ruth Cunningham, Ed Brewer, the members of Piffaro, and
many others, with Gary Wedow conducting.
Kristin Norderval’s Nothing Proved is part of a song cycle (to be premiered next season) scored for the
viols of Parthenia, soprano and interactive audio processing. Using traditional Elizabethan consort song
instrumentation and sensibilities, the work combines a 21st century musical aesthetic and technology,
giving the music simultaneously a Renaissance and contemporary sound. The composition presents the
words of one of the most powerful and enigmatic women in history in an interpretation reflecting the
intelligence and emotional edge of the poetry
SUNG TEXTS
NOTHING PROVED
Sung Texts – adapted from the following poems:
The Doubt of Future Foes
The doubt of future foes exiles my present joy,
And wit me warns to shun such snares as threaten mine annoy;
For falsehood now doth flow, and subjects' faith doth ebb,
Which should not be if reason ruled or wisdom weaved the web.
But clouds of joy untried do cloak aspiring minds,
Which turn to rain of late repent by changed course of winds.
The top of hope supposed the root upreared shall be,
And fruitless all their grafted guile, as shortly ye shall see.
The dazzled eyes with pride, which great ambition blinds,
Shall be unsealed by worthy wights whose foresight falsehood finds.
The daughter of debate that discord aye doth sow
Shall reap no gain where former rule still peace hath taught to know.
No foreign banished wight shall anchor in this port;
Our realm brooks not seditious sects, let them elsewhere resort.
My rusty sword through rest shall first his edge employ
To poll their tops that seek such change or gape for future joy.
On Monsieur's Departure
I grieve and dare not show my discontent,
I love and yet am forced to seem to hate,
I do, yet dare not say I ever meant,
I seem stark mute, but inwardly to prate.
I am and not, I freeze and yet am burned.
Since from myself another self I turned.
My care is like my shadow in the sun,
Follows me flying, flies when I pursue it,
Stands and lies by me, doth what I have done.
His too familiar care doth make me rue it.
No means I find to rid him from my breast,
Till by the end of things it be supprest.
Some gentler passion slide into my mind,
For I am soft and made of melting snow;
Or be more cruel, love, and so be kind.
Let me float or sink, be high or low.
Or let me live with some more sweet content,
Or die and so forget what love ere meant.
ABOUT THE ARTISTS
Parthenia, hailed by the New Yorker as "one of
the brightest lights in New York's early-music
scene," is a dynamic ensemble exploring the
extraordinary repertory for viols from Tudor
England to the court of Versailles and beyond.
Known for its remarkable sense of ensemble,
Parthenia is presented in concerts across
America, and produces its own lively and
distinguished concert series at Corpus Christi
Church in NYC, collaborating regularly with the
world's foremost early music specialists and has
been featured on radio and television and in
prestigious festivals and series including Music
Before 1800, Maverick Concerts and the
Regensburg Tage Alter Musik.
Noteworthy among Parthenia's inventive
programs have been a presentation of the
complete instrumental works of Robert Parsons
at Columbia's Miller Theatre, and the complete
viol fantasies of Henry Purcell at the Cathedral
of St John the Divine. Parthenia performs often
at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, both in
Grace Rainey Rogers Auditorium and in the
Museum's Medieval Sculpture Hall, and
appeared in conjunction with the exhibition,
"Searching for Shakespeare," at the Yale Center
for British Art. Parthenia’s popular touring
program, “When Music and Sweet Poetry
Agree,” is a unique collaboration with actor Paul
Hecht and soprano Jacqueline Horner, a
celebration of Shakespearean poetry and music.
Parthenia has commissioned, premiered and
recorded many new works by composers such as
Phil Kline, Brian Fennelly, Will Ayton, Randy
Sandke, John Stone, Nicholas Patterson, and
others, in part through grants from the American
Composers Forum, the Camargo Foundation,
Roger Williams University, the Viola da Gamba
Society of America, and private funds. An
ASCAP/CMA Award honored Maverick
Concerts' 2002 Season, which included two
world premieres of works by Brian Fennelly,
commissioned especially by Maverick for
Parthenia. Through a 2006 grant from the
Jerome Foundation, Parthenia is excited to be
commissioning and premiering "Nothing Proved
Can Be," a new song cycle for viol consort,
voice and interactive audio processing, set by
composer Kristin Norderval to the extraordinary
poetry of Queen Elizabeth I. Parthenia recently
recorded a new CD of the works of Will Ayton,
"A Reliquary for William Blake," on the MSR
Classics label.
Parthenia is represented by GEMS Live! Artist
Management: www.gemsny.org/gemslive
For more information about Parthenia, please
visit www.parthenia.org.
Barbara Feldon is best known as “99” -- the
secret Agent on the TV series, Get Smart.
During her career she has performed in
television films, variety shows, and motion
pictures, (only one of which she wishes to recall:
the Michael Richie film Smile). On stage
Barbara performed in the Circle in the Square
production of Past Tense, the off Broadway
musical Cut the Ribbons, and her one woman
show, Love for Better or Verse. Over the years
she has developed a number of poetry and prose
readings: Great Love Poetry, Pablo Neruda in
His Own Words, Jane Austin, and Virginia
Woolf. Because of Barbara’s interest in
women’s issues, from 1982 to 1984 she hosted
The 80’s Woman on Lifetime Network. She has
served on the boards of Screen Actors Guild,
The Orchestra of St. Lukes, and The Poetry
Society of America. She lectures on women’s
issues and is a passionate supporter of Girls Inc.,
an organization created to help underprivileged
girls develop options. Her book of essays,
Living alone -- and Loving it! was published in
2003 by Simon and Schuster.
Space’s “Selected Shorts” series, broadcast on
National Public Radio.
Acclaimed both as a singer, improviser and
composer, Kristin Norderval has premiered
numerous new works for voice and presented
original compositions incorporating voice,
electronics, and interactive technology at
festivals and concert houses in Europe, the Far
East, and the Americas. Many works including five chamber operas - have been
written specifically for her. A number of these
works have been recorded on Aurora, CRI,
Deep Listening, Eurydice, Koch International,
and New World Records. Her credits as a
soloist include performances with the Philip
Glass Ensemble, the San Francisco Symphony,
Oslo Sinfonietta and the Netherlands Dance
Theater.
Paul Hecht made his Broadway début as The
Player in Tom Stoppard’s Rosencrantz and
Guildenstern Are Dead (Tony nomination,
1968). Other Broadway roles include John
Dickinson in 1776 , Nathan in The Rothschilds,
Rufio in Shaw’s Caesar and Cleopatra, Belcredi
in Pirandello’s Henry IV (both with Rex
Harrison), Stoppard’s Night and Day with
Maggie Smith, the Director in Noises Off, and
as John Ruskin and Jerome K. Jerome in The
Invention of Love. His off-Broadway roles have
included Ralph in the American premiere of
Harold Pinter’s Moonlight, Charlotte Jones’s
Humble Boy and the title role in Pirandello’s
Henry IV, for which he received an Obie award.
Around the country he has appeared as Cyrano
in the world premiere of the Anthony Burgess
translation at the Guthrie, and at the American
Shakespeare Festival as Marc Antony in both
Julius Caesar and Antony and Cleopatra. He has
also performed in plays by Shaw, Chekhov,
Shakespeare, Turgenev, Handke,KaufmanFerber,and Ronald Harwood, at Canada’s Shaw
Festival, the McCarter in Princeton, the
Berkshire Theater Festival, the NY Shakespeare
Festival, Lincoln Center, and the Bay Street in
Sag Harbor. He has appeared in movies with
Bette Davis, Jane Fonda, Jeremy Irons, Chris
Rock and Howard Stern. He was in Every Good
Boy Deserves Favour (Stoppard-Previn), and
Facade (Walton-Sitwell) with the Philadelphia
Orchestra, and in the Soldiers Tale conducted by
Robert Craft He performs regularly in literary
events at the 92nd st Y where he recently
directed Edna St Vincent Millays Conversation
at Midnight, and is heard annually in Symphony
In 2004 and 2005 she was awarded a
Norwegian Artists Stipend for creation of new
inter-disciplinary works for the stage, and in
2005 she received the Henry Cowell Award
recognizing her innovative work as a
composer. Among her compositions are
works for concert, stage and film.
Commissions include works for Den Anden
Opera in Copenhagen, the Bucharest
International Dance Festival in Romania,
jill sigman/thinkdance in New York City, and
the early music ensemble Parthenia, the latter
as part of the Jerome Composers
Commissioning Program.
Norderval is the co-founder and
vocalist/laptop performer of the electroacoustic duo ZANANA, and a member of
Pauline Oliveros' improvising quintet the New
Circle Five. Kristin Norderval received her
Doctor of Musical Arts from Manhattan
School of Music in New York City in 1993.
Her undergraduate and Masters studies were
completed at the University of Washington
and the San Francisco Conservatory of Music.
She is currently a Research Fellow at the
University of Østfold in Halden, Norway,
investigating training and creation methods in
the interdisciplinary performing arts.
[ \
ABOUT THE COMPOSERS
Max Lifchitz was born in México City in 1948,
and has resided in New York since 1966. A
graduate of The Juilliard School and Harvard
University, his works have been performed
throughout the US, Europe and Latin America.
Lifchitz has taught at Columbia University, the
Manhattan School of Music and The University
at Albany, SUNY. His works have garnered
fellowships and awards from, among others, the
ASCAP, Ford and Guggenheim Foundations;
the New York State Council for Arts Individual
Artist Program; and from the National
Endowment for the Arts. Also active as pianist
and conductor, his compositions and
performances may be heard on the Classic
Masters, CRI, Finnadar, New World,
North/South, Opus One, Phillips, RCA Victor
and Vienna Modern Masters record labels.
Born in Mexico City, David P. Thompson is a
composer and classical guitarist who supports
his composition habit by teaching throughout
New York City. A commission from the New
York Wind Symphony and the French-American
School of Music in September of 2007 resulted
in the composition, Collage: Triptych for Winds
premiered at Christ and St. Stephen’s Church.
Mr. Thompson holds degrees from USC and the
Mannes College of Music where he studied with
Christopher Berg and Michael Newman.
David Glaser was born in Manhattan in 1952
and studied at Hunter College (BA), Queens
College (MA) and Columbia University (DMA)
where he worked with Mario Davidovsky,
George Edwards, Martin Boykan and Jack
Beeson. In 2007 he was awarded a Fromm
Foundation commission to compose a piece for
Parthenia. He has also received a Academy
Award in Music from the American Academy of
Arts and Letters, a CAP Grant and a Margaret
Fairbank Jory Copying Assistance Grant from
the American Music Center, the Dr. Boris and
Eda Rapoport Prize in Composition at Columbia
University and Fellowships from the MacDowell
Colony and Wellesley Composer Conference.
He has been composer-in-residence at the
NewMusic@ECU festival at East Carolina
University. He is a past President of the United
States section of the League of
Composers/ISCM.
His music is published by APNM. The
American Academy of Arts and Letters
describes his work as “…subtly potent music of
important potential.” His music has been
commissioned by the New York New Music
Ensemble, Judith Kellock, Susan Narucki, Linda
Larson, Elizabeth Farnum, the Cygnus
Ensemble, the Anderson-Fader Guitar Duo, the
Peconic Chamber Orchestra, the New Jersey
Percussion Ensemble, the New York New Music
Ensemble and Glaux, the new music ensemble
of Temple University. He is Assistant Professor
at Stern College of Yeshiva University in New
York.
Frances White composes instrumental and
electronic music. She studied composition at the
University of Maryland, Brooklyn College, and
Princeton University. She has received awards,
honors, grants, commissions, and fellowships
from organizations such as Prix Ars Electronica
(Linz, Austria), the Institut International de
Musique Electroacoustique de Bourges (France),
the International Computer Music Association,
Hungarian Radio, ASCAP, the Bang On A Can
Festival, the Other Minds Festival, the New
Jersey Symphony Orchestra, the Dale Warland
Singers, the American Music Center, the Mary
Flagler Cary Charitable Trust, the Guggenheim
Foundation, the MacDowell Colony, the
Djerassi Resident Artists Program, and the Alice
M. Ditson Fund of Columbia University. She
recently completed The ocean inside, a work
commissioned by the Third Practice Festival at
the University of Richmond for the acclaimed
ensemble eighth blackbird. Ms. White's music
can be heard on CD on the Wergo, Centaur,
Nonsequitur, Harmonia Mundi, and Bridge
Records labels. A CD devoted to her
electroacoustic chamber works, Centre Bridge,
was released in August of 2007 on the Mode
Records label. Ms. White's music was featured
as part of the soundtrack of two of Gus Van
Sant's award-winning films: Elephant and
Paranoid Park. Ms. White studies the
shakuhachi (Japanese bamboo flute), and finds
that the traditional music of this instrument
informs and influences her work as a composer.
Much of Ms. White's music is inspired by her
love of nature, and her electronic works
frequently include natural sound recorded near
her home in central New Jersey.
Born in New York City in 1969 to a musical
family, composer Paul Richards has been
engaged with music since childhood, including
forays into various popular styles, the Western
canon, and Jewish sacred and secular music
through his father, a cantor. All of these
experiences inform his creative activities, which
have included numerous orchestral, vocal,
chamber, and theatrical works. Hailed in the
press as a composer with “a strong, pure melodic
gift, an ear for color, and an appreciation for
contrast and variety,” and praised for his “fresh
approach to movement and beautiful orchestral
coloration,” his works have been heard in
performance throughout the country and
internationally on six continents. He has been
recognized in numerous competitions, including
the Jacksonville Symphony Orchestra’s Fresh
Ink 2002 Florida Composers’ Competition, the
International Section of the 2000 New Music for
Sligo/IMRO Composition Award and the 2001
and 2004 Truman State University/M.A.C.R.O.
Composition Competition. Other honors and
awards include Special Distinction in the 2006
ASCAP Rudolph Nissim Prize, Finalist in the
2006 American Composers Orchestra Whitaker
Reading Sessions, Second Prize in the
International Horn Society Composition
Competition in 2001, First Place in the 1999
Voices of Change Composers Competition, two
First Place prizes in the Guild of Temple
Musicians Young Composers Award (1994-95,
1995-96) and many others. Commissions have
come from organizations including the
Jacksonville Symphony Orchestra, Florida State
Music Teachers’ Association and Music
Teacher’s National Association, Duo 46,
Sonoran Consort, Meet the Composer-Arizona,
Arizona Repertory Singers, Arizona
Commission on the Arts and Catalina Chamber
Orchestra. In addition, many university wind
programs have commissioned Richards’ work,
including those of Baylor, Florida, Illinois –
Champaign/Urbana, Michigan, Nevada – Las
Vegas, North Carolina – Greensboro, Northern
Iowa, Syracuse and Truman State. “Fables,
Forms, and Fears,” a CD of Richards’ chamber
music, was released by Meyer Media in July of
2007. Music by Paul Richards is also recorded
on the Capstone, Mark, Summit, and MMC
labels, including a recent recording featuring
famed clarinetist Richard Stoltzman and the
Slovak Radio Orchestra. His works are
published by Southern Music, TrevCo Music,
the International Horn Society Press, and
Margalit Music. Currently associate professor
of composition at the University of Florida, he
previously taught at Baylor University, and
earned the Doctor of Musical Arts degree in
Composition at the University of Texas at
Austin, and Bachelor of Music and Master of
Music degrees in Theory and Composition at the
University of Arizona
UPCOMING NY PERFORMANCE
(for more information and reservations, call Parthenia at 212-358-5942)
Friday, Aril 25, 2008 at 8pm
Corpus Christi Church, 529 West 121st Street, NYC
PARTHENIA
&
EX UMBRIS
with Paul Shipper, Tom Zajac, Grant Herreid, Nell Snaidas and Karen Hansen
THE QUEEN’S COUTIERS
Listen at the keyhole of the Queen’s Presence Chamber as Elizabeth’s courtiers vie for favor and
power. Songs and ballads of Sir Walter Raleigh, Sir Philip Sydney, Dowland and Hume.
Parthenia thanks the following individuals and organizations for their wonderful
support:
JoCarole Lauder, Agnes Gund and Daniel Shapiro, Time Warner, Michael Sivy, Phong Bui,
Gary Wedow, Janet and David Offensend, Virginia and Richard Storr, Johnson & Johnson,
Elizabeth Guiher, Nancy Tooney, Louise Basbas, Sam Chell, Jane Furth and Augie Matzdorf,
Michael Rigsby, Wendy Steiner, Brigitte Segmuller, Webster Williams, Naomi and Stephen
Antonakos, Nancy Goldring, Samuel and Linda Kramer, Hans & Judy Lie, Jill Samant, Irving
and Lucy Sandler, Michael & Nina Sundell, Regan Heiserman and Bob Karen, Amanda Pond,
Margaret Brown, Norma Cote, Rackstraw Downes, Paula Gannon, Alain and Ariane Kirili,
Patsy Rogers, Hugh Young , John Behan, Anna Burton, Suzanne Darrow, Gladys Foxe,
Manfred Korman, Judith Murray, Joyce Richardson, Peter and Sally Saul, Tom Warren, Laura
and Michael Goudket, William Atkinson, Joy Hudecz, Max Lifchitz, Lawrence Loewinger,
Nona Mosiej, Arthur Williams, Evelyn Simon, Grace Feldman, Susan Hellauer, Cynthia Shaw
and David Simonoff, Bonnie Lassen
Parthenia acknowledges the following people and organizations for help in making this
concert possible:
William Wegman and Christine Burgin, Brian Kerrigan and Picture Ray Studios, GEMS, Gary
Wedow, Michael Terry, Rober Storr; Dongsok Shin Recordings
Parthenia is a sponsored project of the New York Foundation for the Arts.
Parthenia's concert season is made possible with public funds from the New York State Council on
the Arts, a state agency.
Leadership support for Meet The Composer's MetLife Creative Connections Program is
generously provided by MetLife Foundation. Additional support is provided by The Amphion
Foundation, Argosy Foundation Contemporary Music Fund, BMI Foundation, Inc., Mary Flagler
Cary Charitable Trust, Aaron Copland Fund for Music, Inc., The William & Flora Hewlett
Foundation, The James Irvine Foundation, Jerome Foundation, mediaThefoundation, National
Endowment for the Arts, New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, New York State Council
on the Arts, Pennsylvania Council on the Arts and Virgil Thomson Foundation, Ltd
Picture Ray Studio
8 p.m. Wednesday, March 5, 2008
Picture Ray Studio
8 p.m. Wednesday, March 5, 2008