Wings of Fire incorporates a reading by Ellie Epp of the poem Wings of Fire by BC poet Joy Kristin. In the work, the lover addressed in the poem is personified by the cello which is also the source of all the material used to create the tape part. This material consists only of short fragments of bowing on the bridge of the instrument, natural and artificial harmonics, snap pizzicato, and col legno attacks (using the wooden part of the bow to hit the string). The sounds on tape that resemble bowed notes are in fact synthesized using digital resonators that model the behaviour of a string, each tuned to the pitch of one of the cello’s open strings. These resonators are used to process both the cello sounds and the text such that at certain moments the voice and instrument merge as one. Wings of Fire was commissioned by Vancouver New Music for its 1997 Canadian tour.

Interprètes

• Frances-Marie Uitti, violoncelle

To Robert Black

Androgyne, mon amour incorporates a setting of six poems by Tennessee Williams from his book of the same title, as read by Douglas Huffman. The poems are intensely lyrical, intimate and erotic in a celebration of gay love that is acted out, both musically and dramatically, by the live performer interacting in a variety of conventional and unconventional ways with the instrument which is personified as his lover. Both the vocal part and various sound material from the bass are digitally processed through resonators that model the characteristics of the open strings of the instrument, thereby linking them sonically and musically, as if each is speaking through the other. The work was commissioned by and is dedicated to the virtuoso American double bassist Robert Black.

Interprètes

• Robert Black, contrebasse

Interprètes

• Robert Black, contrebasse

Interprètes

• Robert Black, contrebasse

Interprètes

• Robert Black, contrebasse

Interprètes

• Robert Black, contrebasse

Interprètes

• Robert Black, contrebasse

Interprètes

• Robert Black, contrebasse

Interprètes

• Robert Black, contrebasse

Patterns presents Amy Lowell’s much anthologized poem Patterns in a live, theatrical performance surrounded by a soundscape created from a reading of the poem by Diana McIntosh and various Victorian sounds such as a ticking, chiming clock, spinning wheel, birdsong and a stream. Lowell (1874-1925), a descendant of a distinguished New England family, professed no great love for the “new woman,” but in this poem the suffocating patterns of conventional femininity are symbolized by the stiff brocaded dress the speaker longs to throw aside. Patterns was commissioned by and for Diana McIntosh (whose voice is heard in the tape part) and premiered at a Groundswell concert of the same name in Winnipeg.

Interprètes

• Elizabeth Carefoot, voix

To Janneke Ritsema van Eck

In She, a Solo I created a complex acoustic environment within which a personality, that created by the voice, could emerge and develop. The tape at first is driving and overpowering for the soloist whose own confusion is expressed by numerous vignettes or styles of vocalization suggesting different characters. As the energy of the tape subsides, the soloist emerges into a solo lyrical role that progressively becomes more florid. Suddenly, the voice changes and the tape reappears, and the two interact now on a more equal basis, leading to a final state of peaceful equilibrium. The work is dedicated to Janneke Ritsema van Eck and was commissioned by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation for Phyllis Mailing.

Interprètes

• Phyllis Mailing, mezzo-soprano

In Memoriam A.H.H. (and Hymn to the Moon) are excerpts of my electroacoustic opera Powers of Two. In the first act, the duet (a setting of one of 131 stanzas written by Tennyson in memory of his friend, Arthur Hallam) is sung by two male characters, one gay, the other straight; however, in keeping with the “twin souls” theme, this version is performed by the same singer doing both parts and is followed by a solo using a Whitman text from Leaves of Grass which also celebrates male bonding. The Hymn to the Moon is sung in Act 3 by the Sibyl in celebration of female powers.

Interprètes

• Marcel van Neer, ténor

Hymn to the Moon (and In Memoriam A.H.H.) are excerpts of my electroacoustic opera Powers of Two. In the first act, the duet (a setting of one of 131 stanzas written by Tennyson in memory of his friend, Arthur Hallam) is sung by two male characters, one gay, the other straight; however, in keeping with the “twin souls” theme, this version is performed by the same singer doing both parts and is followed by a solo using a Whitman text from Leaves of Grass which also celebrates male bonding. The Hymn to the Moon is sung in Act 3 by the Sibyl in celebration of female powers.

Interprètes

• Sue McGowan, alto

Twin Souls consists of two choral arrangements of music from Powers of Two. At different times in different cultures, the image of “twin souls” has captured some of the same symbolism found in the opera, whether expressed as an erotic or spiritual desire for union with an “ideal other.” The concept takes on added significance when it is understood in terms of same-sex relationships, as is lyrically expressed by such writers as the 17th century English poet Katherine Philips (“the matchless Orinda”) in odes to her women friends, or the medieval Sufi mystic Rumi in his passionate praise of the dervish Shams i Tabriz. In our own century, Rilke grappled with the loss of the beloved in his First Duino Elegy, hence a requiem in the first piece for the “too young departed,” whether from AIDS or other causes. In the second piece, the transcendant joy derived from a union with the “divine beloved” is expressed again by Philips and in the east coast aboriginal song We Are The Stars Which Sing. The tape part in the work is derived from resonated breath and singing, as well as Pacific Rim percussion sounds.

Interprètes

• Vancouver Chamber Choir
• Jon Washburn, chef

Création

• 5 avril 2007, Surrounding Sound, Simon Fraser University – Theatre, Burnaby (Colombie-Britannique, Canada)

Interprètes

• Vancouver Chamber Choir
• Jon Washburn, chef

Interprètes

• Vancouver Chamber Choir
• Jon Washburn, chef