Format : Score and Parts
SKU: PR.44641256L
UPC: 680160596010. 11 x 17 inches. Key: A major.
Fanfare; Reminiscence and Celebration is in 2 movements. I. Fanfare The opening of a concert hall is always an exciting event, introducing the hall to the performers and the performers to the hall each testing the capacities of the other. I decided to have the ensemble greet and salute the new Ruby Diamond Hall with a Fanfare that includes offstage brass players in 3 different locations in the audience. II. Reminiscence and Celebration The 2nd movement begins in a reflective mood. As I thought about Ruby Diamond Hall, where I had performed as a teenager, I remembered people, particularly many mentors with whom I have performed here, who are gone, but whose gifts and spirits are still with us. The theater has a beautiful tradition of leaving one light bulb burning all night long for the spirits of the actors who have graced that stage. While I wanted my 2nd movement to acknowledge that sense of continuity of past and present, the piece ends in celebration of the new. Perhaps all artists feel a strong connection with the past, but we work in and for the present and we build for the future.Fanfare; Reminiscence and Celebration is in 2 movements. I. Fanfare The opening of a concert hall is always an exciting event, introducing the hall to the performers and the performers to the hall a each testing the capacities of the other. I decided to have the ensemble greet and salute the new Ruby Diamond Hall with a Fanfare that includes offstage brass players in 3 different locations in the audience. II. Reminiscence and Celebration The 2nd movement begins in a reflective mood. As I thought about Ruby Diamond Hall, where I had performed as a teenager, I remembered people, particularly many mentors with whom I have performed here, who are gone, but whose gifts and spirits are still with us. The theater has a beautiful tradition of leaving one light bulb burning all night long for the spirits of the actors who have graced that stage. While I wanted my 2nd movement to acknowledge that sense of continuity of past and present, the piece ends in celebration of the new. Perhaps all artists feel a strong connection with the past, but we work in and for the present and we build for the future.Fanfare; Reminiscence and Celebration is in 2 movements. I. Fanfare The opening of a concert hall is always an exciting event, introducing the hall to the performers and the performers to the hall -- each testing the capacities of the other. I decided to have the ensemble greet and salute the new Ruby Diamond Hall with a Fanfare that includes offstage brass players in 3 different locations in the audience. II. Reminiscence and Celebration The 2nd movement begins in a reflective mood. As I thought about Ruby Diamond Hall, where I had performed as a teenager, I remembered people, particularly many mentors with whom I have performed here, who are gone, but whose gifts and spirits are still with us. The theater has a beautiful tradition of leaving one light bulb burning all night long for the spirits of the actors who have graced that stage. While I wanted my 2nd movement to acknowledge that sense of continuity of past and present, the piece ends in celebration of the new. Perhaps all artists feel a strong connection with the past, but we work in and for the present and we build for the future.Fanfare; Reminiscence and Celebration is in 2 movements.I. FanfareThe opening of a concert hall is always an exciting event, introducing the hall to the performers and the performers to the hall — each testing the capacities of the other. I decided to have the ensemble greet and salute the new Ruby Diamond Hall with a Fanfare that includes offstage brass players in 3 different locations in the audience.II. Reminiscence and CelebrationThe 2nd movement begins in a reflective mood. As I thought about Ruby Diamond Hall, where I had performed as a teenager, I remembered people, particularly many mentors with whom I have performed here, who are gone, but whose gifts and spirits are still with us. The theater has a beautiful tradition of leaving one light bulb burning all night long for the spirits of the actors who have graced that stage. While I wanted my 2nd movement to acknowledge that sense of continuity of past and present, the piece ends in celebration of the new. Perhaps all artists feel a strong connection with the past, but we work in and for the present and we build for the future.
SKU: PR.446412560
ISBN 9781598063738. UPC: 680160596003. 9x12 inches. Key: A major.
SKU: PR.362034230
ISBN 9781598069556. UPC: 680160624225. Letter inches. English.
When the Texas Choral Consort asked Welcher to write a short prologue to Haydn's The Creation, his first reaction was that Haydn already presents Chaos in his introductory movement. As he thought about it, Welcher began envisioning a truer void to precede Haydn's depiction of Chaos within the scope of 18th-century classical style - quoting some of Haydn's themes and showing human voices and inhuman sounds in a kind of pre-creation melange of color, mood, and atmosphere. Welcher accepted this challenge with the proviso that his prologue would lead directly into Haydn's masterpiece without stopping, and certainly without applause in between. Scored for mixed chorus and Haydn's instrumentation, Without Form and Void is a dramatically fresh yet pragmatic enhancement to deepen any performance of Haydn's The Creation. Orchestral score and parts are available on rental.When Brent Baldwin asked me to consider writing a short prologue to THE CREATION, my first response was “Why?â€Â THE CREATION already contains a prologue; it’s called “Representation of Chaosâ€, and it’s Haydn’s way of showing the formless universe. How could a new piece do anything but get in the way? But the more I thought about it, the more it made sense. The Age of Enlightenment’s idea of “Chaos†was just extended chromaticism, no more than Bach used (in fact, Bach went further).Perhaps there might be a way to use the full resources of the modern orchestra (or at least, a Haydn-sized orchestra) and the modern chorus to really present a cosmic soup of unborn musical atoms, just waiting for Haydn’s sure touch to animate them. Perhaps it could even quote some of Haydn’s themes before he knew them himself, and also show human voices and inhuman sounds in a kind of pre-creation mélange of color, mood, and atmosphere. So I accepted the challenge, with the proviso that my new piece not be treated as some kind of “overtureâ€, but would instead be allowed to lead directly into Haydn’s masterpiece without stopping, and certainly without applause. I crafted this five minute piece to begin with a kind of “music of the spheres†universe-hum, created by tuned wine glasses and violin harmonics. The chorus enters very soon after, with the opening words of Genesis whispered simultaneously in as many languages as can be found in a chorus. The first two minutes of my work are all about unborn human voices and unfocused planetary sounds, gradually becoming more and more “coherent†until we finally hear actual pitches, melodies, and words. Three of Haydn’s melodies will be heard, to be specific, but not in the way he will present them an hour from now. It’s almost as if we are listening inside the womb of the universe, looking for a faint heartbeat of worlds, animals, and people to come. At the end of the piece, the chorus finally finds its voice with a single word: “God!â€, and the orchestra finally finds its own pulse as well. The unstoppable desire for birth must now be answered, and it is----by Haydn’s marvelous oratorio. I am not a religious man in any traditional sense. Neither was Haydn, nor Mozart, nor Beethoven. But all of them, as well as I, share in what is now called a humanistic view of how things came to be, how life in its many forms developed on this planet, and how Man became the recorder of history. The gospel according to John begins with a parody of Genesis: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.â€Â  I love that phrase, and it’s in that spirit that I offer my humble “opener†to the finest work of one of the greatest composers Western music has ever known. My piece is not supposed to sound like Haydn. It’s supposed to sound like a giant palette, on which a composer in 1798 might find more outrageous colors than his era would permit…but which, I hope, he would have been delighted to hear.
SKU: PR.11440744S
UPC: 680160011490. 9.5 x 13 inches.
The sextet was written for flute (doubling alto flute), clarinet doubling bass clarinet), violin, cello, piano and percussion (triangle, 3 temple blocks, 2 wood blocks, side drum, cymbal, 4 tom-toms, vibraphone, small tam-tam, median tam-tam and big tam-tam). It presents the composer lost in thought about ancient culture and modern civilization and her thinking about the parallels and contrasts between the East and the West. Near Distance takes us through a journey that covers thousands of miles and thousands of years. Contrasting moments of dense, busy activity with sparse, haunting lines the composer bridges the gap between the timeless history of her homeland and the ever-changing, energetic life in the modern society. The work was originally written under the request of Prof. Jacob Druckman, for a composition workshop at the Aspen Music Festival. It is dedicated to his memory with admiration and respect. Near Distance has been featured in Sound and Silence, a series of ten documentary films on contemporary music, which has been broadcast on the European TV network since 1989, produced by the ISCM, Adamov Films and the Polish TV. It has also been recorded on CRI, released in 1999, under the title Sparkle: Chamber Music of Chen Yi. [now available through New World Records] --Chen Yi Her piece... generates a vivid and wholly radiant color scheme. Harmonically, too, it seems to float enchantingly, its occasional ventures into microtones gracefully bending away from traditional tonality. Gorgeous music, this; one longs to hear more. --Alan Rich, LA Weekly 'Near Distance' evinced some delicate, dramatic sonorities in its fusion of East Asian and Western musical impulses. --John von Rhein, Chicago Tribune.
