PROGRAM NOTES by James Randall Jennifer Higdon (b. 1962): Fanfare Ritmico (2000) With a Pulitzer Prize, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and several Grammys under her belt, Jennifer Higdon is also among the most frequently programmed living composers. Her professional journey is all the more remarkable as she got a bit of a late start in music. She taught herself to play flute at age 15, and she only wrote her first compositions in her early 20s. Incredibly prolific since, her compositions include orchestral music, an opera, chamber works, and music for symphonic wind ensemble. Ensuring that her works are accessible to a general listening audience is a particular priority. She writes “I always tell people that my music should speak to them… and that they shouldn’t feel obligated to say why or how. All reactions are valid; the important thing is to have the experience.” Fanfare Ritmico was commissioned in 1999 by the Women’s Philharmonic, a San Franciscobased orchestra made up entirely of women and dedicated to performing works solely by women. As she composed the work, Higdon found herself “reflecting on how all things have quickened as time has progressed. Our lives now move at speeds much greater than what I believe anyone would have ever imagined in years past… This fanfare celebrates the rhythmic motion, of man and machine, and the energy which permeates every moment of our being in the new century.” And, as it turns out, our lives haven’t gotten any slower in the nearly quarter century since the work’s premiere. In this virtuosic piece, listen particularly for the spatial distribution of musical sounds across the orchestra. Higdon scored it in such a way that the music often moves across the stage from one side to the other, similar to the effect you might get listening to a stereo recording on headphones.
Pascal Le Boeuf (b. 1986): Triple Concerto for Violin, Percussion Duo, and Orchestra (2022) Pascal Le Boeuf is a genre-bending young composer, pianist, and producer whose works fuse influences from jazz, classical, and electronic music. His work “Alkaline” earned a 2017 Grammy nomination for “Best Instrumental Composition.” Other accolades include first place in the 2008 International Songwriting Competition, the ASCAP Foundation Johnny Mandel Prize, and several New Jazz Works Commissions from Chamber Music America. In the preface to his score, Le Boeuf writes that his Triple Concerto is “about new beginnings, adapting to change, and creating stability in a chaotic environment…” In the midst of the pandemic, Le Boeuf and his partner, also a composer, welcomed a new baby, Baxter, into their family. Both parents were determined to find time to continue to compose, and, at that point, art truly began to imitate life. On the form of the piece, the composer confesses that “the structure is based on childcare.” In the notebook he used to draft musical ideas, Le Boeuf had scribbled the couple’s hectic daily plan to ensure care for Baxter and time for them both to write music. According to the composer, the back-and-forth relay “provided a perfect structure for the form of the concerto—or was it the other way around? I don’t think I’ve ever restarted a piece so many times, generated so many ideas, or been sidetracked so consistently.” Ultimately these diversions and false starts found their way into the heart of the concerto “in the form of themes traded between the soloists and the orchestra that are consistently interrupted or redirected to other areas.” For all the parents in the audience who remember similar scenarios, this piece is for you!
Gustav Mahler (1860-1911): Symphony No. 1 in D Major, “Titan” (1887-1888) Listening to Mahler is an immersive experience. He once shared with the composer Jean Sibelius that “A symphony must be like the world. It must contain everything.” His music is DYNAMIC TRIO
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