Echo! on " Ho#zon
solo piano
Echoes on the Horizon
for solo piano
i. damson meadow
ii. quilt of stars
iii. Riffles and rapids
Echoes on the Horizon was commissioned by Chuck Sheketoff for his wife Naseem Rakha, on the occasion of her 65th birthday. Naseem is a deeply inspiring author, journalist and educator. We met during a fellowship at Brush Creek Foundation for the Arts in Wyoming, forged an enduring friendship, and later collaborated on the choral work We Exist, a response to the 2017 violence in Charlottesville, Virginia.
Naseem is a tree hugger through and through, always wandering a forest, climbing a mountain or rafting a river. For each of the three movements in this piece, Chuck selected an important place that beats in Naseem’s heart. “Damson Meadow” recalls hiking together at the Tom McCall Preserve in the Columbia River Gorge, a memory the three of us share. “Quilt of Stars” is an ode to Naseem’s volunteer shifts at the Green Ridge Lookout in Deschutes National Forest, seminal periods of solitude and refection. A little side note about this movement: the melodies were hewn from a musical anagram of Naseem’s name. Finally, “Riffles and Rapids” envisions a playful journey down the Colorado River, through the Grand Canyon. I hear Naseem’s joyous laughter echoing through the stone walls.
Oliver Caplan | music@olivercaplan.com | 617.894.0359 | www.olivercaplan.com
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