COMPOSERS CHAMBER ORCHESTRA
Mark Alburger, Music Director
Tales of the Wanderers
8pm, Saturday, October 10, 2015
Park Presidio United Methodist Church, 4301 Geary Boulevard, San Francisco, CA
Mark Alburger, John Kendall Bailey, and Martha Stoddard, conducting
Program
Martha Stoddard
Horse (2013)
Allan Crossman
Impromptoodle (2015)
Mark Alburger
Sejong the Great, Op. 235 (2015)
I. Early Life (Going Away Through the Arirang Mountain Pass)
II. Achievements (Changbu-Taryeon Entertainer)
III. Literature (Chung-Sun-Gok Clear-High)
IV. Hangul Alphabet (Jindo Arirang Island)
V. Death (Milyang Eastern)
VI. Relations (Monggeumpo Harbor)
VII. Family (Parangsae Blue Bird)
VIII. Official Titles (Sae Taryeong Bird Song)
IX. Depictions (Sang-Rung-San Buddha Prayer)
X. Portrait (Sijo-Chang Courtesan)
Intermission
Lisa Scola Proek
Lucaria (2015)
I. Overture
II. Barcarolle ("their ships are leaving...")
Michael Kimbell
Golden Gate Barcarole (2014)
Stardust
A la recherche des danses perdues (In Search of Lost Dances, 2015)
I. Danse des fées distraites [Dance of the distracted faeries]
II. Danse de la Cour des Miracles [Dance of the Court of Miracles]
III. Danse des âmes tourmentées [Dance of the tormented souls]
IV. Danse des hiboux magiques [Dance of the magical owls]
V. Danse des escargots véloces [Dance of the rapid snails]
VI. Danse des papillons géants [Dance of the gigantic butterflies]
VII. Danse des feuilles tremblantes [Dance of the fluttering leaves]
VIII. Danse des ronds dans l'eau stagnante [Dance of the ripples in still water]
IX. Danse des grenouilles qui croassent [Dance of the croaking frogs
X. Danse des libellules suspendues [Dance of the hovering dragonflies]
XI. Aléatoire [Free-for-all]
SAN FRANCISCO COMPOSERS CHAMBER ORCHESTRA
Mark Alburger Music Director and Conductor
Erling Wold Associate Music Director
John Kendall Bailey Associate Conductor
Martha Stoddard Associate Conductor
Piccolo / Flute / Alto Flute
Harry Bernstein
Bruce Salvisberg
Oboe / English Horn
Stardust
Clarinet
Michael Kimbell
Tenor Saxophone
Michael Cooke
Bassoon
Michael Cooke
Michael Garvey
Contrabassoon
Lori Garvey
Trumpet
Michael Cox
Horn
Brian Holmes
Trombone
Scott Sterling
Piano
Lisa Scola Prosek
Davide Verotta
Percussion
Victor Flaviano
Cynthia Seagren
Anne Szabla
Violin I
Kristen Kline
Violin II
Corey Johnson
Viola
Nansamba Ssensalo
Cello
Ariella Hyman
Bass
John Beeman
MARK ALBURGER (b. April 2, 1957, Upper Darby, PA) studied with Gerald Levinson and Joan Panetti at Swarthmore College (B.A.), Karl Kohn at Pomona College, Jules Langert at Dominican University (M.A.), Tom Flaherty and Christopher Yavelow at Claremont Graduate University (Ph.D.), and Terry Riley. He is Founder and Music Director of the San Francisco Composers Chamber Orchestra and The Opus Project, Conductor of San Francisco Cabaret Opera / Goat Hall Productions, and Adjunct Professor in Music Literature and Theory at Diablo Valley College. Alburger has been the recipient of many honors, awards, and commissions -- including yearly ASCAP Standard Awards; grants from Meet the Composer, the American Composers Forum, MetLife, and Theatre Bay Area; funding from the Marra, Zellerbach, Hewlett, and Getty Foundations; and performances by ensembles and orchestras throughout the world. Alburger's concert and dramatic compositions combine atonal, collage, neoclassic, pop, and postminimal sensibilities -- often in overall frameworks troped on pre-existent material. His complete works (245 opus numbers to date, including the work-in-progress Four Michaels) are being issued on recordings from New Music. 500+ videos of his compositions may be found on the DrMarkAlburger YouTube channel, as well as many other websites. Alburger's Alma Marie Schindler Mahler Gropius Werfel, Op. 232, will be premiered this summer at the Dean Lesher Center in Walnut Creek.
SEJONG THE GREAT, Op. 235 (2015), was written for and is dedicated to The Sejong Cultural Society -- in appreciation for its introducing the composer to 10 wonderful Korean melodies, the pitches of which (altered only in movement II) have been gene-spliced into dynamic / rhythmic / timbral frameworks inspired by Pierre Boulez's Le Marteau sans Maitre. Each movement of Sejong has a differing instrumentation of two to five timbres with respect to seven possibilities (flute, clarinet, piano [augmented baroquely by bassoons in this performance], violin arco, violin pizz, cello arco, cello pizz), and additionally corresponds to subsections of the Wikipedia article on the titular Joseon-dynasty king (1397-1450). Overall textural result is a heterophonic sound-world in homage to 15th-century Korean court music. The form is a trilogy of trilogies, with coda: three trios of two pieces with direct repetitions, followed by one without -- i.e., movements 1-2 / 4-5 / 7-8 are repeated, with 3 / 6 / 9 respectively as through-composed / progressive-revelation- dissolution passacaglia / double (elaborated written-out-repeat). The tenth selection has two literal repeats, followed by a two-bar non-cyclic conclusion. Tempo markings are rather Erik Satiean, with the designations of I. and VI. combined in X. Other pitch-rhythmic configurations allude to Japan, sea chanty, Ludwig van Beethoven, swing, and minimalism.
ALLAN CROSSMAN has had the great pleasure of writing for soloists and ensembles worldwide on both concert and theater stages, including many commissions. Compositions have received special awards and commentary, as has his teaching. His pieces, from solo piano to orchestra, have appeared in England, Spain, Brazil, Australia, across North America, including several over the last 10 years with San Francisco Composers Chamber Orchestra. He has composed/music-directed for many theater companies, among them Goat Hall, The Cambridge Ensemble, Centaur Theatre of Montreal, and the Royal Shakespeare Co. He was music director of the Anne of Green Gables musical tour of Montreal and Hong Kong, and creator of the soundtrack for the award-winning animated film X MAN, National Film Board of Canada. Crossman has taught at Concordia University (Montreal), San Francisco Conservatory, Wheaton College (MA), Pacific Conservatory, and the John Adams Young Composers Program at the Crowden School. Further information may be found at acrossman.com.
This single movement IMPROMPTOODLE is a light and playful impromptu - ongoing variations on the popular Yankee Doodle Dandy. All instruments enter into the constant turnover of the tune and rampant counterpoint, including a full chorus in “squeeze horn” style.
MICHAEL KIMBELL studied composition with John Davison and Alfred Swan at Haverford College and with Robert Palmer and Karel Husa at Cornell University where he received his doctorate in 1973. His music has been performed throughout the San Francisco area as well as Germany, Austria and Canada. Arcadian Symphony won the Southern Arizona Symphony Prize in 1998 and has also been performed by the Mission Chamber Orchestra and the Oakland Civic Orchestra. Poème for violin and harp was featured at the 2011 World Harp Congress in Vancouver. Ballade Arctique for solo harp, recorded by Katrina Szederkényi and released on commercial CD (MSR Classics MS1527), was featured at the 2014 Camac Harp Festival in Perpignan, France.
GOLDEN GATE BARCAROLLE is a tone poem that paints a musical picture of the Golden Gate. Over a gentle, rhythmic ocean swell (hence the piece’s title), the music suggests fog and mist, rocks and cliffs, hills and clouds, the great bridge and the city lights beyond. Individual instruments and sections of the orchestra are showcased throughout.
LISA SCOLA PROSEK has composed and produced nine operas in San Francisco, including The Lariat (winner of the NY Center for Contemporary Opera Award), and Daughter of The Red Tzar (currently in production at Long Beach Opera). Scola Prosek is a graduate of Princeton, where she studied composition with Milton Babbitt and Edward Cone. Her work is available at Theodore Front Music Publishers. For more information is available at wwwScolavox.org.
Written in collaboration with the historians of the Fort Ross Conservancy, LUCARIA is the story of the Russian, German, Mexican, and American occupation of the Fort Ross highlands, as experienced by a Pomo woman, Lucaria.
STARDUST is a radical composer living in the "somewhat embattled and mythical sanctuary" of San Francisco. "Ze" spends a fair amount of time traveling, which inspired the current A la recherche des danses perdues and last summer's Railway Sonata. "Per" works include chamber music and symphonic music prepared for encouraging friends at such events as the Humboldt Chamber Music Workshops and welcoming ensembles such as the Opus Project Orchestra, the Golden Gate Symphony, and of course the San Francisco Composers Chamber Orchestra. You may occasionally catch Stardust playing the "Hautbois or the Cor anglé. ;-)"
"Riffing off the renowned Marcel Proust novel, and conceived during summer 2015 at the Folleterre sanctuary in confabulation with real-life faeries, A LA RECHERCHE DES DANSES PERDUES (IN SEARCH OF LOST DANCES) is a fantastic imagination of somewhere once upon a time where distracted faeries could introduce a Court of Miracles, the refuge of twirling mendicants and magicians. It is the dances of tormented souls, magical owls, rapid snails, and gigantic butterflies who inhabit a mythical land just far enough from here to be there instead. Fluttering leaves and ripples in still water accompany croaking frogs and hovering dragonflies in this dreamscape of dance. Should you feel so moved, sit back, close your eyes, listen to the music, and let these lost dances flicker into your awareness."
MARTHA STODDARD Martha Stoddard has held the position of Artistic Director of the Oakland Civic Orchestra since 1997. From 2012-2014 she served for as Program Director for the John Adams Young Composers Program at the Crowden Music Center, and is an Associate Conductor of the San Francisco Composers’ Chamber Orchestra. Ms. Stoddard has been the Director of Instrumental Music at Lick-Wilmerding High School since 1991. Her music has been performed by the Sierra Ensemble, AvenueWinds, San Francisco Choral Artists, San Francisco Composers’ Chamber Orchestra, schwungvoll!, Oakland Civic Orchestra, Womensing, Bakersfield Symphony New Directions Series, Community Women’s Orchestra, Trinity Chamber Concert Series, the New Music Forum Festival of Contemporary Music and in London, UK. Recent commissions have come from the Left Coast Chamber Ensemble, Sierra Ensemble, Community Women's Orchestra, Octangle Woodwind Octet and the San Francisco Wind Festival. She was recently awarded a Judges’ Citation from The American Prize celebrating her catalog of compositions as "Music for Use. Well Crafted, Accessible and Performance-Ready." Ms. Stoddard is a four-time recipient of AscapPlus Awards and holds music degrees from Humboldt State University and San Francisco State University. She is published by Tetractys in London, UK and Shadow Tree Music Publishing in Concord, California.
HORSE was commissioned by the Left Coast Chamber Ensemble for the inaugural season of their Intersection Workshop in 2013. The charge was to compose a short, fun, and accessible piece for skilled amateur players. This title reflects a fondness for repetitive rhythms of galloping horses, and the vantage point that sitting on a horse offers when stopping to study the terrain. Horse shares a close kinship with the orchestral piece, Gait Changes, premiered recently by the San Francisco Composers’ Chamber Orchestra.
DONATIONS:
Archangel
(Contributing $1000 +)
Mark Alburger
Alexis Alrich
Lisa Scola Prosek
Sue Rosen
Erling Wold
Angel
(Contributing $500-$999)
Adobe, inc
John Beeman
Michael & Lisa Cooke
Anne Dorman
David & Joyce Graves
Ken Howe
Anne Baldwin
Hanna Hymans-Ostroff
Anne Szabla
Davide Verotta
Benefactor
(Contributing $100-$499)
Christopher & Sue Bancroft Kenneth & Ruth Baumann
Susan M. Barnes
Marina Berlin & Anthony Parisi
Bruce & Betsy Carlson
Patrick & Linda Condry
Rachel Condry
Connie & George Cooke
Steven Cooke
Patti Deuter
Thomas Goss
James Henriques
Marilyn Hudson
John Hiss & Nancy Katz
Susan Kates
Ronald Mcfarland
Ken & Jan Milnes
James Schrempp
Martha Stoddard
James Whitmore
Vivaty, Inc
Donor
(Contributing $50-$99)
Paul & Barbara Boniker
Mark Easterday
Sabrina Huang
Donna & Joseph Lanam
Harriet March Page
Larry Ochs
CF Peters
Barbara & Mark Stefik
Roberta Robertson
Patron
(Contributing up to $49)
Susie Bailey
Schuyler Bailey
Harry Bernstein
Joanne Carey
Hannes & Linda Lamprecht
Elinor Lampson
Anthony Mobilia
Deborah Slater
To make a tax-deductible donation, please send a check made out to:
Erling Wold's Fabrications
629 Wisconsin Street
San Francisco, CA 94107
Please include a note saying you want the money to go to the San Francisco Composers Chamber Orchestra.
***
Another wonderful concert, in a welcoming venue -- the end of a busy interval,
including
a
local
coife,
and another transit via 80, 680 (printing programs at CyberCopy), 4,
Richmond Parkway, 580,
Sir Francis Drake,
and
101 --
with a scenic
diversion
along
Lincoln,
Clement,
and
Geary.
Late return, composing page 5 re Four Michaels (Zodiac Concerto, after The Book of Jude), Op. 245, on the 232nd day of summer, high back down to 91 (an ABA the last three days of 91 93 91): by now, 95 / 152 days at 90 / 80+ for the year... with 72 in SF...
