Reena Esmail, composition, October 19, 2017

Robert Blocker, Dean

doctor of musica l a rts r ecita l

Reena Esmail composition

Thursday, October 19, 2017 • 7:30 pm Morse Recital Hall

doctor of musical arts recital

Reena Esmail, composition October 19, 2017 • Morse Recital Hall

Reena Esmail b. 1983

Tuttarana (2014) vocal ensemble Joseph Kemper, conductor Nadiya (2017) Ben Larsen, cello Julie Lee, flute Chuti Hui Jagah (2015) Evanna Lai, mezzo-soprano Liliya Ugay, piano intermission This Love Between Us: Prayers For Unity, excerpts (2016) IV. Zoroastrianism VI. Jainism VII. Sufi Islam vocal ensemble Joseph Kemper, conductor Liliya Ugay, piano Reena Esmail, hindustani vocals Devesh Chanda, tabla

yale school of music

Esmail

“Still I Rise,� from I Rise: Women in Song (2016) text by Maya Angelou Joseph Kemper, conductor Addy Sterrett, soprano Liz Hanna, soprano Antonia Chandler, alto Bradley Sharpe, alto Lilya Ugay, piano Take What You Need (2016) vocal ensemble Morse Chorale Joseph Kemper, conductor

This performance is in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Doctor of Musical Arts degree

ensemble rosters

Vocal Ensemble Addy Sterrett, soprano Liz Hanna, soprano Antonia Chandler, alto Bradley Sharpe, alto Wonhee Lim, tenor Will Watson, tenor Will Doreza, bass Charles Littlewood, bass

Music in Schools Intiative Morse Chorale Stephanie Tubiolo, director Carina Andrea Lizamishel Boateng Peter Bradley Darnell Charles MacHenry Charles Marnielle Charles Nicdaniel Charles Destiny Dawson Nala Diarrassouba Efrencheli Ducos Brianna Edwards Simone Henderson Hannah Guo Alisha Legeon Veronette Legeon Yashaira Leguisamon James Maciel-Andrews MacKenzie Noreikis Diego Padilla Matthew Perez Elijah Rious Sophia Rivkin Vanessa Rivkin Gabriel RodrĂ­guez Rosealiyah RodrĂ­guez Ambar Santiago-Rojas Sepantam Shoajee Sofia Shubin Lincy Valeta Julieanne Wilkin Jalah Woods Gabriella Xavier

artist profiles

Reena Esmail, composition Indian-American composer Reena Esmail works between the worlds of Indian and Western classical music, and brings communities together through the creation of equitable musical spaces.

Esmail holds degrees from The Juilliard School and the Yale School of Music, and was a Fulbright grantee to India.

In the past season, Esmail has written commissions for Lehigh University’s women’s chorus and orchestra, clarinetist Shankar Tucker, the Albany Symphony Orchestra, Imani Winds, and Yale’s Institute of Sacred Music / Juilliard415.

Upcoming commissions include those from the Chicago Sinfonietta, Albany Symphony, Brooklyn Rider, Brooklyn Youth Chorus, and violinist Vijay Gupta.

In addition to her work as a composer, Esmail is the co-artistic director of Shastra, a nonprofit organization that promotes cross-cultural music that connects the great musical traditions of India and the West.

She is also the composer-in-residence with Street Symphony, where she works with communities experiencing homelessness and incarceration in Los Angeles.

Music in Schools Initiative Morse Chorale Formed in July 2015, the Morse Chorale is one of several ensembles born from a partnership between the New Haven Public Schools and the Yale School of Music. The Chorale’s singers are between nine and seventeen years old, and represent twelve different schools. The Morse Chorale is known for its eclectic repertoire, which includes classical music spanning several centuries, choral arrangements of jazz and gospel songs, spirituals, and folk music from around the world. Though the ensemble is young, its schedule is full: most recently, the Morse Chorale was featured at the Connecticut Music Educator’s Association All-State Conference, the statewide superintendent’s retreat, the Urban Music Leadership Conference, in concert with the Yale Camerata, and in frequent performances on the ensemble’s home stage in Sprague Hall at Yale. Since its founding, the Morse Chorale has sung under the direction of Stephanie Tubiolo.

notes on the program

Tuttarana (2014) The title of this piece is a conglomeration of two words: the Italian word “tutti” means “all” or “everyone,” and the term “tarana” designates a specific Hindustani (North Indian) musical form whose closest Western counterpart is the “scat” in jazz.

Made up of rhythmic syllables, a tarana is the singer’s chance to display agility and dexterity. While a Hindustani tarana is a solo form, I wanted to bring the tarana into an ensemble setting.

Tuttarana was commissioned by the Mount Holyoke Glee Club.

Nadiya (2017) Though most of my writing in the last few years has been for large ensembles, I’ve also had three commissions for duos, the second of which was Nadiya. While larger works are usually commissioned by organizations or conductors, these duos were all commissioned by the people who have played them — in many cases to celebrate and deepen their musical relationships with each other.

Nadiya (NUH-dee-yuh) means “river” in Hindi. In this music, the two lines run together, cascade in phrases that complete one another, pull apart in time for long stretches, and then find their way back together. It has no meter, and barely any bar lines. The more the two musicians know and trust each other, the longer they’ve played together, the further they can take the piece. It is a piece of music designed to grow with the musicians who play it.

Nadiya was commissioned by Benjamin Larsen and Martha Cargo for Pieces of Eight.

Chuti Hui Jagah (2015) When I lived in India in 2012, I was introduced to the work of Manav Kaul, an incredible Hindi-language playwright, actor, and poet living in Bombay. Hindi is a language that has become increasingly anglicized in its evolution.

While there is so much beautiful ancient work in Sanskrit and Brijbasha (some of Hindi’s precursors), poetry in modern, shudh (pure) Hindi is much harder to find. In fact, much of the best modern creative writing by curent Indian authors is in English. Kaul’s work, though, provides a very special insight into the world of modern India through its native language. As a playwright, Kaul has a particular ear for the way words flow through time — the words he writes are conceived to be heard aloud. Kaul’s poetry uses simple and direct language to express deep and complex sentiments.

Chuti Hui Jagah (The Space Between) is a cycle of three of Kaul’s most pithy poems, originally set for mezzo and guitar. It is a series of vignettes, each of which dwells in a different space between two objects, two events, two states. “Ek Shabd” (“One Word”) explores the space between a single word falling onto a page, and a full play being read aloud. “Joota” (“Shoe”) explores the space between pain and numbness. And “Aavaz” (“Sound”/“Voice”) explores the space between silence and sound.

notes on the program

This Love Between Us: Prayers For Unity, excerpts (2016)

career as a Western composer. And my Fulbright year, studying Hindustani music in India, opened my ears and mind to the world of Hindustani classical music. One day in late 2015, after months of pleading with embassies, government officials, and agencies, I finally lost the battle for the visa I needed to return to India, simply because my grandfather had moved his family to Pakistan in the 1950s. I have never been more heartbroken in my life. The pain of being from two places is that, wherever you are, you always miss the other place. And somehow, as if in answer to my despair, the very next day I received the email asking me to write this piece — the one you will hear today.

If it is impossible to be in both places at once, or at all, I have strived every day since then to create this hybrid, united world in my music.

This Love Between Us is a piece about unity.

Its seven movements juxtapose the words of seven major religious traditions of India (Buddhism, Sikhism, Christianity, Zoroastrianism, Hinduism, Jainism, and Islam), and specifically how each of these traditions approaches the topic of unity, of brotherhood, and of being kind to one another. The texts come either straight from canonical religious writings or from poets who write through the lens of their religion. Each text is itself a union: it is set simultaneously in English and in its original language (with the exception of the Christian text, where the Malayalam is a translation), so you can hear the beauty of the original and grasp its meaning through translation. Each movement also contains a unique combination of Indian and Western classical styles, running I wrote This Love Between Us through the continuum from the Christian some of the darkest times in our country movement, which is rooted firmly in a and in our world. But my mind always baroque style, to the Zoroastrian movement, returns to the last line of this piece, the which is a Hindustani vilambit bandish. words of Rumi, which are repeated like a Each of the other movements live mantra over affirming phrases from each somewhere in between these two musical religion, as they wash over one another: cultures in their techniques, styles, and “Concentrate on the Essence. Concentrate forms. But even more than uniting musical on the Light.� practices, this piece unites people from two different musical traditions: a sitar and This Love Between Us was commissioned tabla join the choir and baroque orchestra. by the Yale Institute of Sacred Music Each of the musicians is asked to keep one hand firmly rooted in their own tradition and training, while reaching the other hand outward to greet another musical culture.

This piece is also a union for me. The time I spent studying at both Yale and Juilliard have been the foundation of my

notes on the program

“Still I Rise,” from I Rise: Women in Song (2016)

formances have taken place in jails, homeless shelters, support groups, schools, memorial services, places of worship — in places The genre of women’s choral music is very where people can gather to see and honor special to me. The first piece of music I the humanity in one another. Take What ever wrote, at age thirteen, was for the You Need was written for the Urban choir at the all-girls middle school I Voices Project, a choir made up of people attended in Los Angeles, long before I who are experiencing or have recently knew it was even possible to be a experienced homelessness — so many of professional composer. Each of the whom have trusted this piece with their movements of I Rise: Women in Song is own stories of loss and redemption, and inspired by the words of a female author who I am so honored to count among my who has shaped our world with her dearest friends. But this piece is also thoughts and actions. Some of the meant to be a resource for musicians and movements are sweet, subtle, and nostalgic. communities to come together and build Others are fiery and bold. Some coalesce the lasting relationships that plant seeds into their shape as they move along and for social change. others unravel toward their ends. Each movement is a reflection on a single facet I am so honored to present this piece of the multifaceted experience of being a tonight in conjunction with the YSM’s woman in this world. incredible community partnership: the Music in Schools Initiative. I am honored “Still I Rise,” one of the most famous poems to have the students of the Morse Chorale of Maya Angelou, is the closing joining us on stage tonight for this very movement of the five-movement work, special performance. which was premiered by a 200-woman choir and chamber orchestra at Lehigh Take What You Need is licensed under University on the eve of the 2016 U.S. Creative Commons, and scores/parts for presidential election. The message is still many different arrangements of the work as direct and powerful today as the day are available for free at streetsymphony.org/ she wrote it. takewhatyouneed.

I Rise: Women in Song was commissioned

by Lehigh University Choral Arts Take What You Need (2016) Of the many performances of Take What You Need, very few of them have been in traditional concert halls. (In fact, this is the first time I’ve ever had to write program notes for this piece). Most per-

Take What You Need was commissioned by the Street Symphony for Urban Voices Project

Text and translations

Chuti Hui Jagah (2015) एक शब्द…

One Word...

एक शब्द… थर-थर कांपता-सा, पन्ने पर गिरा।

One word...

Making a thar-thar shivering sound, Fell onto the page.

एक कहानी…

One story....

कविता के सुर में कही गई और नहीं कहीं गई, जैसी बातों में पूरी हुई।

What was said and unsaid in the flow of the poem, Was completed in those thoughts.

नाटक के से सुर में मैंने उसे, डरते-डरते पढ़ा।

From the tones of the drama, I fearfully read it.

कहीं एक बच्चे ने, थमे हुए पानी में एक पत्थर फैंका…।

Somewhere, a child, Pausing, threw a pebble into still water...

और कहीं दूर, अबाबील नाम की चिड़िया उड़ गई।

And somewhere far away, A bird called the skylark flew away.

जूता…

Shoe

जूता जब काटता है… तो जिंदगी काटना मुश्किल हो जाता है।

When the shoe bites Then it becomes difficult to delineate / navigate through the world And when the shoe stops biting Then it becomes difficult to delineate / navigate through time.

और जूता काटना जब बंद कर देता है… तो वक्त काटना मुश्किल हो जाता है।

आवाज़…

Voice/Sound

लंबे चले आ रहे सन्नाटे में … दो बूंद आवाज़ की पड़ी। दूर एक चिड़ियाँ, अपना घर बनाने में… चोंच को पेड़ पर मार रही थी।

From the long, epic silence Two drops of sound fell Far away, a bird Making its home Knocked a tree with its beak

Text

This Love Between Us: Prayers For Unity, excerpts (2016) IV. All humankind would know its own lineage and stock; hamāg mardōm paywand ud tōhmag ī xwēš dānist hē; never would a brother be abandoned in love by his brother nor a sister by her sister. haguriz brād ōy ī brād ud xwah ōy ī xwah az dōstīh bē nē hišt hē. from the Pahlavi Rivayat (8a8) (English and Pahlavi)

VI. If the mind is sinful, blamable, intent on works, acting on impulses, producing cutting and splitting, quarrels, faults and pains, if it injures living beings, if it kills creatures, then one should not employ such a mind in action. tǝhǝpǝgārǝm mǝnǝm nō pǝdhārĭjjā gǝmǝnāĕ.

If the speech is sinful, blamable, intent on works, acting on impulses, producing cutting and splitting, quarrels, faults and pains, if it injures living beings, if it kills creatures, then one should not utter that sinful speech. tǝhǝpǝgārǝm vāĭm nō ŭccārĭjjā. jĕ yĕ mǝnĕ pāvǝĕ sāvǝjjĕ sǝkĭrĭyĕ ǝnhǝyǝkǝrĕ chǝyǝkǝrĕ bhǝyǝkǝrĕ ǝhĭgǝrǝnĭĕ pāŭsĭĕ pārĭyāvĭĕ bhūōvǝghāĭĕ tǝhǝpǝgārǝm mǝnǝm nō pǝdhārĭjjā gǝmǝnāĕ. from the Acharanga Sutra (Jain text) (Part 3: Lecture 15) (English and Ardha Maghadi)

Text

VII. The lamps may be different, but the Light is the same. All religions, all this singing, one song.

I have bestowed on each one a unique mode of worship, I have given every one a unique form of expression.

I look not at the tongue and speech, I look at the spirit and the inward feeling.

Religions are many, God is one.

The lamps are different, but the Light is the same: it comes from Beyond. Concentrate on the essence, Concentrate on the Light. Ōm shāntĭ shāntĭ shāntĭ Sādhū Sādhū Wāhĕgŭrū Āmīn Āmĕn Wāj Bāj Concentrate on the Light.

Rumi (along with affirming phrases in other religions)

Text

Take What You Need (2016) Take a moment Take a breath Take time Take care Take hope Take heart Take a step Take a chance Take courage take charge Take a stand Take pride Take joy Take pause Take a moment Take a breath Take what you need.

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