SKU: PR.165001000

ISBN 9781491129241. UPC: 680160669776. 9 x 12 inches.

Commissioned for a consortium of high school and college bands in the north Dallas region, FOR THEMYSTIC HARMONY is a 10-minute inspirational work in homage to Norwood and Elizabeth Dixon,patrons of the Fort Worth Symphony and the Van Cliburn Competition. Welcher draws melodic flavorfrom five American hymns, spirituals, and folk tunes of the 19th century. The last of these sources toappear is the hymn tune For the Beauty of the Earth, whose third stanza is the quatrain: “For the joy of earand eye, For the heart and mind’s delight, For the mystic harmony, Linking sense to sound and sight,”giving rise to the work’s title.
This work, commissioned for a consortium of high school bands in the north Dallas area, is my fifteenth maturework for wind ensemble (not counting transcriptions). When I asked Todd Dixon, the band director whospearheaded this project, what kind of a work he most wanted, he first said “something that’s basically slow,” butwanted to leave the details to me. During a long subsequent conversation, he mentioned that his grandparents,Norwood and Elizabeth Dixon, were prime supporters of the Fort Worth Symphony, going so far as to purchase anumber of high quality instruments for that orchestra. This intrigued me, so I asked more about his grandparentsand was provided an 80-page biographical sketch. Reading that article, including a long section about theirdevotion to supporting a young man through the rigors of the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition fora number of years, moved me very much. Norwood and Elizabeth Dixon weren’t just supporters of the arts; theywere passionate lovers of music and musicians. I determined to make this work a testament to that love, and tothe religious faith that sustained them both. The idea of using extant hymns was also suggested by Todd Dixon,and this 10-minute work is the result.I have employed existing melodies in several works, delving into certain kinds of religious music more than a fewtimes. In seeking new sounds, new ways of harmonizing old tunes, and the contrapuntal overlaying of one tunewith another, I was able to make works like ZION (using 19th-century Revivalist hymns) and LABORING SONGS(using Shaker melodies) reflect the spirit of the composers who created these melodies, without sounding likepastiches or medleys. I determined to do the same with this new work, with the added problem of employingmelodies that were more familiar. I chose five tunes from the 19th century: hymns, spirituals, and folk-tunes.Some of these are known by differing titles, but they all appear in hymnals of various Christian denominations(with various titles and texts). My idea was to employ the tunes without altering their notes, instead using aconstantly modulating sense of harmony — sometimes leading to polytonal harmonizations of what are normallysimple four-chord hymns.The work begins and ends with a repeated chime on the note C: a reminder of steeples, white clapboard churchesin the country, and small church organs. Beginning with a Mixolydian folk tune of Caribbean origin presentedtwice with layered entrances, the work starts with a feeling of mystery and gentle sorrow. It proceeds, after along transition, into a second hymn that is sometimes connected to the sea (hence the sensation of water andwaves throughout it). This tune, by John B. Dykes (1823-1876), is a bit more chromatic and “shifty” than mosthymn-tunes, so I chose to play with the constant sensation of modulation even more than the original does. Atthe climax, the familiar spiritual “Were you there?” takes over, with a double-time polytonal feeling propelling itforward at “Sometimes it causes me to tremble.”Trumpets in counterpoint raise the temperature, and the tempo as well, leading the music into a third tune (ofunknown provenance, though it appears with different texts in various hymnals) that is presented in a sprightlymanner. Bassoons introduce the melody, but it is quickly taken up by other instruments over three “verses,”constantly growing in orchestration and volume. A mysterious second tune, unrelated to this one, interrupts it inall three verses, sending the melody into unknown regions.The final melody is “For the Beauty of the Earth.” This tune by Conrad Kocher (1786-1872) is commonly sung atThanksgiving — the perfect choice to end this work celebrating two people known for their generosity.Keeping the sense of constant modulation that has been present throughout, I chose to present this hymn in threegrowing verses, but with a twist: every four bars, the “key” of the hymn seems to shift — until the “Lord of all, toThee we praise” melody bursts out in a surprising compound meter. This, as it turns out, was the “mystery tune”heard earlier in the piece. After an Ivesian, almost polytonal climax, the Coda begins over a long B( pedal. At first,it seems to be a restatement of the first two phrases of “For the Beauty” with long spaces between them, but it soonchanges to a series of “Amen” cadences, widely separated by range and color. These, too, do not conform to anykey, but instead overlay each other in ways that are unpredictable but strangely comforting.The third verse of “For the Beauty of the Earth” contains this quatrain:“For the joy of ear and eye, –For the heart and mind’s delightFor the mystic harmonyLinking sense to sound and sight”and it was from this poetry that I drew the title for the present work. It is my hope that audiences and performerswill find within it a sense of grace: more than a little familiar, but also quite new and unexpected.

SKU: PR.114420410

UPC: 680160687015.

In one of the dedicatory poems to his verse play The Shadowy Waters (1906), William Butler Yeats asks: Is Eden far away...? Do our woods and winds and verponds cover more quiet woods, More shining winds, more star-glimmering ponds? Is Eden out of time and out of space? How do you answer such questions? We have only the vague elusive promptings of our own mysterious, troubled hearts to tell us that the Eden we long for is there, somewhere beyond the physical world which frames our existence, in another realm of different dimensions. And - what is most painful to admit - that it is closed to us in the form in which we live and breathe, even if at times we do have intimations..., Yeats is telling us that this paradise, this Eden we yearn for is here - present even if invisible, palpable even if intangible. In his Second Symphony, Mahler meets an angel who tells him he can't get into heaven, he's locked out. The news is shattering. What follows is an inconsolable sorrowing, the same sorrowing that comes when we wake to the realization that we too are locked out of Eden. Eden is the heaven of our longing and desire for release from pain and suffering. Eden is the image in our restive minds that reflects the reconciled, resolved, quiescent state of soul we hunger for. But Eden eludes -because it is not a place. It is a state of soul which answers none of the illusory, hampering conditions that shape and bind us to the real world of our bodies, our appetites, our passions, and our beliefs. I have turned Yeats' question Is Eden out of time and out of space? into its own answering. However near we may sense its presence at times, Eden remains unreachable, ungraspable, unknowable, unthinkable. It forever eludes us. I wrote this music the way I did to shut out -with quietness and otherworldliness - the clamor and clang of the raucous Garish Day, to turn away its tumult and noise, to negate its stridency and chaos. Perhaps in the cleansing stillness and blessing of this emptied-out state of soul, Eden, through still hidden, may not be so far way; though still unreachable, may be close enough almost to touch.
In one of the dedicatory poems to his verse play “The Shadowy Waters” (1906), William Butler Yeats asks:“Is Eden far away…?Do our woods and windsand verponds cover morequiet woods,More shining winds,more star-glimmeringponds?Is Eden out of timeand out of space?”How do you answer such questions? We have only the vague elusive promptings of our own mysterious, troubled hearts to tell us that the Eden we long for is there, somewhere beyond the physical world which frames our existence, in another realm of different dimensions. And – what is most painful to admit – that it is closed to us in the form in which we live and breathe, even if at times we do have intimations…, Yeats is telling us that this paradise, this Eden we yearn for is here – present even if invisible, palpable even if intangible.In his Second Symphony, Mahler meets an angel who tells him he can’t get into heaven, he’s locked out. The news is shattering. What follows is an inconsolable sorrowing, the same sorrowing that comes when we wake to the realization that we too are locked out of Eden.Eden is the heaven of our longing and desire for release from pain and suffering. Eden is the image in our restive minds that reflects the reconciled, resolved, quiescent state of soul we hunger for. But Eden eludes –because it is not a place. It is a state of soul which answers none of the illusory, hampering conditions that shape and bind us to the real world of our bodies, our appetites, our passions, and our beliefs.I have turned Yeats’ question “Is Eden out of time and out of space?” into its own answering. However near we may sense its presence at times, Eden remains unreachable, ungraspable, unknowable, unthinkable. It forever eludes us.I wrote this music the way I did to shut out –with quietness and otherworldliness – the clamor and clang of the raucous “Garish Day,” to turn away its tumult and noise, to negate its stridency and chaos. Perhaps in the cleansing stillness and blessing of this emptied-out state of soul, Eden, through still hidden, may not be so far way; though still unreachable, may be close enough almost to touch.

SKU: PR.11442041S

UPC: 680160687022.

In one of the dedicatory poems to his verse play The Shadowy Waters (1906), William Butler Yeats asks: Is Eden far away...? Do our woods and winds and verponds cover more quiet woods, More shining winds, more star-glimmering ponds? Is Eden out of time and out of space? How do you answer such questions? We have only the vague elusive promptings of our own mysterious, troubled hearts to tell us that the Eden we long for is there, somewhere beyond the physical world which frames our existence, in another realm of different dimensions. And - what is most painful to admit - that it is closed to us in the form in which we live and breathe, even if at times we do have intimations..., Yeats is telling us that this paradise, this Eden we yearn for is here - present even if invisible, palpable even if intangible. In his Second Symphony, Mahler meets an angel who tells him he can't get into heaven, he's locked out. The news is shattering. What follows is an inconsolable sorrowing, the same sorrowing that comes when we wake to the realization that we too are locked out of Eden. Eden is the heaven of our longing and desire for release from pain and suffering. Eden is the image in our restive minds that reflects the reconciled, resolved, quiescent state of soul we hunger for. But Eden eludes -because it is not a place. It is a state of soul which answers none of the illusory, hampering conditions that shape and bind us to the real world of our bodies, our appetites, our passions, and our beliefs. I have turned Yeats' question Is Eden out of time and out of space? into its own answering. However near we may sense its presence at times, Eden remains unreachable, ungraspable, unknowable, unthinkable. It forever eludes us. I wrote this music the way I did to shut out -with quietness and otherworldliness - the clamor and clang of the raucous Garish Day, to turn away its tumult and noise, to negate its stridency and chaos. Perhaps in the cleansing stillness and blessing of this emptied-out state of soul, Eden, through still hidden, may not be so far way; though still unreachable, may be close enough almost to touch.
In one of the dedicatory poems to his verse play “The Shadowy Waters” (1906), William Butler Yeats asks:“Is Eden far away…?Do our woods and windsand verponds cover morequiet woods,More shining winds,more star-glimmeringponds?Is Eden out of timeand out of space?”How do you answer such questions? We have only the vague elusive promptings of our own mysterious, troubled hearts to tell us that the Eden we long for is there, somewhere beyond the physical world which frames our existence, in another realm of different dimensions. And – what is most painful to admit – that it is closed to us in the form in which we live and breathe, even if at times we do have intimations…, Yeats is telling us that this paradise, this Eden we yearn for is here – present even if invisible, palpable even if intangible.In his Second Symphony, Mahler meets an angel who tells him he can’t get into heaven, he’s locked out. The news is shattering. What follows is an inconsolable sorrowing, the same sorrowing that comes when we wake to the realization that we too are locked out of Eden.Eden is the heaven of our longing and desire for release from pain and suffering. Eden is the image in our restive minds that reflects the reconciled, resolved, quiescent state of soul we hunger for. But Eden eludes –because it is not a place. It is a state of soul which answers none of the illusory, hampering conditions that shape and bind us to the real world of our bodies, our appetites, our passions, and our beliefs.I have turned Yeats’ question “Is Eden out of time and out of space?” into its own answering. However near we may sense its presence at times, Eden remains unreachable, ungraspable, unknowable, unthinkable. It forever eludes us.I wrote this music the way I did to shut out –with quietness and otherworldliness – the clamor and clang of the raucous “Garish Day,” to turn away its tumult and noise, to negate its stridency and chaos. Perhaps in the cleansing stillness and blessing of this emptied-out state of soul, Eden, through still hidden, may not be so far way; though still unreachable, may be close enough almost to touch.

SKU: PR.11441429S

UPC: 680160594054. 9.5 x 13 inches.

Written for Concertante, a string sextet which has commissioned six different works, each highlighting one of its players. In Ran's new work, the second cellist, Zvi Plesser, was spotlighted with an outgoing, intensely lyrical opening theme, according to a New York Times review. Yet, Lyre of Orpheus never overlooks the collaborative, conversational essence of the ensemble. Read the full review here: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/18/arts/music/18conc.html?_r=1&adxnnl=1&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss&adxnnlx=1286200920-wRrt7MJ416+FpOYAUe/IOQ For advanced performers.
Lyre of Orpheus was composed for Concertante, the New York-based string sextet, for its One Plus Five Project, a three-year, six-composer commissioning project designed to create six string sextets, each featuring one of Concertante’s core players. This particular commission was made with the goal of giving center-stage to the ensemble’s first cello, a choice I was especially grateful for, not only because it features Zvi Plesser, the outstanding Israeli cellist, but also because it gave ma an opportunity to highlight an instrument for which, from a very early stage in my life, I have felt a special affinity.  The cell’s “soul”, so naturally combining passion and lyricism, has always touched me in a special way. As sometimes happens, naming the piece was the final act in the process of creation.  Once titled, though, I found myself looking through the piece with a mixture of delight and astonishment – the narrative of the almost iconic mythological story of love and loss seems as one entirely plausible, and to my mind convincing, way to tract the unfolding of the musical events.  Of course, the music was written with no such tale (or any tale, for that matter) in mind.  But perhaps some stories are emblematic of so much that is part of our lives and psyches, of our desires, fears and wishes.  Orpheus, whose longing for Eurydice recognizes no boundaries of heaven and hell…  Love regained, then forever lost…  Orpheus’ lyre intoning his sorrowful yearning… Lyre of Orpheus, approximately fifteen minutes in length, composed in late 2008, is intermittently songful, caressing, passionate, pained, ferocious, longing.  The instrumentation consists of 2 violins, 2 violas, 2 cellos, the first of which is the soloist/protagonist, the second notable for having its lowest string tuned down a third to achieve extra lower notes. This commission has been made possible by the Chamber Music America Commissioning Program, with funding generously provided by the Aaron Copland Fund for Music, and the Chamber Music America Endowment Fund.—Shulamit Ran.