Photinus Program

PHOTINUS A free concert of contemporary music for soprano and percussion DECEMBER 6, 2025 AT 7:00 PM FIRST BAPTIST CHURCH MEDFORD MEDFORD, MA

GENEROUSLY SUPPORTED BY This program is supported by an Operating Grant from the Mass Cultural Council; and a grant from the Medford Arts Council, a local agency, which is supported by the Mass Cultural Council.

UP NEXT

Poems (2020)

Miniatures for Soprano and Vibraphone (2024) me estimo a mi mismo en la tierra Jaime Díaz (b. 1990) I Am I Paolo Griffin (b. 1991) Dolor... Alegria... ....dolor...

Alex Guerrero (b. 1979) Jardín zoológico de nubes Adrienne Inglis (b. 1960) Quero WORLD PREMIERE Mari Esabel Valverde (b. 1987) Midnight (2012)

FAMILY PHOTOS

JAN 30–FEB 1, 2025 | 7:00 PM NEW ENGLAND BOTANIC GARDEN AT TOWER HILL BOYLSTON, MA

Joe Locke (b. 1959)

Axlotl (2017)

Jimena Maldonado (b. 1988)

PHOTINUS (2015)

Stephanie Ann Boyd (b. 1990)

Canção da Despedida (2008)

PERFORMERS

Daniel Berg (b. 1971)

Ney Rosauro (b. 1952)

KELLEY HOLLIS | soprano Kelley Hollis is a classically trained soprano known for her interpretations of new and lesser known works.

Her opera roles include Rosalinda in J. Strauss’ Die Fledermaus, Mimi in Puccini’s La (femme) boheme (MassOpera), Beth in Adamo’s Little Women (Metrowest Opera), Eliza in Muhly’s Dark Sisters (Third Eye Theater Ensemble); Florencia Grimaldi in Catan’s Florencia en el Amazonas, Donna Anna in Mozart’s Don Giovanni, Micaela in Le Tragedie de Carmen, and more. Her most recent concert repertoire includes Vaughan Williams’ Dona Nobis Pacem, Handel’s Messiah, and Faure’s Requiem. Kelley received both her master’s and bachelor’s degrees from Northwestern University and is a graduate of the Boston University Opera Institute.

THOMAS SCHMIDT | percussion One of Boston’s versatile freelance percussionists, Thomas Schmidt has performed with the Boston Philharmonic, the Portland Symphony (Maine), Rhode Island Philharmonic, and the New Bedford Symphony, to name a few.

Thomas is on the faculty at Berklee College of Music where he teaches Orchestral Percussion, Marimba, Vibraphone, and Drum Set. He received his bachelor’s degree in Percussion Performance from the University of Maine, and his master’s Degree in Percussion Performance from the Boston Conservatory. Thomas is a Zildjian-endorsed artist.

ABOUT JUVENTAS

Juventas New Music Ensemble is a contemporary chamber group with a special focus on emerging voices. Juventas shares classical music as a vibrant, living art form. We bring audiences music from a diverse array of composers that live in today’s world and respond to our time. www.juventasmusic.org.

PROGRAM NOTES Daniel Berg | Poems Emily Dickinson was a very original poet. Before her death, she had sent her poems to a local critic, who tried to dissuade her from publishing, considering her poetry too dirty and odd. To get as much contrast as possible in the composition, I chose texts by Dickinson with very different characters for the four first movements. The fifth one is written more like a jazz ballad and some sort of reflection of the poems by Dickinson—a final poem without words.

Jaime Díaz | me estimo a mi mismo en la tierra The text comes from a Nahuatl poem I came across while trying to learn to read and speak dialects from where my family is from. In the poem, the speaker compares themselves to a single flower—fragile, unique, and alone—recognizing their own small place in the world.

Paolo Griffin | I Am I On the side of a building I walked by, just off of Dundas St. West, someone had scrawled the words “I am I” in black paint on a white brick wall. After I began writing this short piece, I remembered the words I had seen written on that building. By the time I started working on this piece, a week later, the words had been removed. Those words became the text for this piece.

Alex Guerrero | Dolor... Alegria... ...dolor...

Dolor... Alegría... ....dolor... is a bittersweet tribute to the formidibly intelligent, talented, and kind-hearted soul who was my loving partner (see photo to the right) taken from this world far too soon as the result of a fire. I composed it as a remembrance on the occasion of her first birthday without her here in this realm.

Ida Sánchez-Tello

Adrienne Inglis | Jardín zoológico de nubes This piece sets an unusual poem by Argentine poet Alfonsina Storni. The poem title, “Cloud Zoo,” entices the reader to imagine cute puffy animals in the clouds. A closer look at Storni’s clouds instead shows betrayal, violence, gore, and revenge. The music uses dissonance and a bit of tango flavor to create the angst.

Mari Esabel Valverde | Quero While the style for Quero would not necessarily be best described as pop, my ear for Portuguese has been influenced by over a decade of intentional listening to artists such as Da Lata, Celso Fonseca, Marisa Monte, Maria Rita, and Gisele de Santi. I created the first sketch of this miniature by singing and recording it in a voice memo in October 2019.

Joe Locke | Midnight Jazz vibraphonist and composer Joe Locke is widely considered to be one of the major voices of his instrument. Midnight is an ethereal solo that has become a welcome addition to the solo vibraphone repertoire. It is featured in a collection of six solo works for the vibraphone.

Jimena Maldonado | Axolotl “There was a time when I thought a great deal about the axolotls. I went to see them in the aquarium at the Jardin des Plantes and stayed for hours watching them, observing their immobility, their faint movements. Now I am an axolotl.”

—Julio Cortázar Stephanie Ann Boyd | PHOTINUS PHOTINUS refers the Rover Fireflies, a specific genus of firefly. I’ve always been endlessly fascinated with these tiny beacons of light, and misnamed them “thunder bees” as a small child. This piece was dreamed up in the summer of 2015, in Manhattan, where I was so starved for sounds of nature.

Ney Rosauro | Canção da Despedida (Farewell Song) This piece is in memory of my dear friend Jose Pedro Boessio. I wrote the piece on the day I got the news of his tragic passing, and I could feel his presence and imagined his voice singing the melody for me. I often play this piece as an encore.

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