Brightmusic Chamber Ensemble

Libby Larsen  (b. 1950), Corker for Clarinet and Percussion 

One of America’s most celebrated living composers, Libby Larson has written over 400 works encompassing virtually every genre.  She won a Grammy for her song cycle Sonnets from the Portuguese, and in 2010 she received a Peabody Medal for Outstanding Contributions to Music in America. 

The term “corker” was a 1920s slang term meaning, “an excellent or astonishing person or thing.”  The term was also used in the early Big Band era meaning something explosive.  Much of Larsen’s work blurs the lines between classical and jazz.  Corker is seven minutes of sheer virtuosic energy.  Says the composer, “One person suggested that I title this piece something like ‘Gene Krupa Goes Mad.’ “  

Joan Tower (b. 1938),  Small (for solo percussion)

Tower is an acclaimed American composer, pianist and conductor.  She earned her doctorate in composition from Columbia in 1968.  She has held several distinguished posts, including composer-in-residence with the St. Louis Symphony, and has received many prestigious awards, among them a Grammy award in 2016 for her composition Stroke.  

The name “Small” refers to the size of the percussion instruments and the table which holds them.  Tower wrote, “I always thought that percussionists have too much work to do hauling big equipment . . . so I decided to write a piece where smaller instruments would be able to fit onto a tiny table.”  These instruments are used to create an aural journey through an intriguing miniature soundscape.

Peter Klatzow (1945-2021), Dances of Earth and Fire for Solo Marimba

South African composer Peter Klatzow earned a scholarship to study at the Royal College of Music in London, where he won several honors including the Royal Philharmonic prize for composition and later studied under Nadia Boulanger in Paris. His compositions frequently highlight the marimba, and Dances of Earth and Fire calls upon the instrument's full range of octaves and intensity.

Klatzow remarks, "These two ritualistic pieces reflect on the one hand the solidity and all-embracing gravity of the Earth itself, and the evanescent flickering of flame, which always seeks to rise upwards and escape into the beyond. These become metaphors for life and death, or earth-bound; spirit-bound forces."

Alexina Louie (b. 1949), Cadenzas for Clarinet and Percussion 

The works of Canadian Alexina Louie have garnered numerous awards, including the Order of Canada and two Juno Awards. The Vancouver native earned an ARCT in Piano Performance from the Royal Conservatory of Music at the age of 17.  She has a Bachelor of Music History and a M.A. degree in composition from the University of California San Diego. 

Written in 1985 and revised in 1987, the four-movement Cadenzas for Clarinet and Percussion is an intensely virtuosic exploration of the power of percussion to thrill and captivate.  The piece juxtaposes the harsh and biting with mystery and suspense.  Full of driving rhythms and mood changes, Cadenzas is an absorbing acoustic experience. 

Franz Schubert (1797-1828), String Trio in B-flat, D. 471

Although Austrian composer Franz Schubert died at a tragically young age, he completed over 1500 works. Following declining health, he died of unknown causes at the age of 31. His chamber music is among the finest examples of the genre, and even Beethoven was a fan of the much younger composer. 

Phenomenally prolific, Schubert started compositions faster than he could compete them in the short time he had remaining.  He started three trios but only one—the third—was completed and all of them in the sunny key of B-flat.  The second of the three, D. 471, consists of a complete first movement and an incomplete second. It is a charming early Romantic work in the Classical tradition of Haydn or Mozart. 

Jean Sibelius (1865-1957), String Trio in G Minor 

Regarded as Finland’s greatest composer, Jean Sibelius is best known for his symphonies, his tone poems Finlandia and the Karelia Suite and the mysterious Swan of Tuonela  He all but stopped composing in 1926.  The silence of his last 30 years has been the subject of much speculation, but the composer said merely he had composed enough.  

The String Trio in G Minor, written in 1893-94, is one of four trios Sibelius wrote and belongs to his mature chamber works. Only the first movement was completed, with fragments of a second and third. The jarring largo begins with slashing crescendos and maintains the dramatic intensity through slowly evolving thematic elements before peacefully dissolving in a placid chorale.

Osvaldo Golijov (b. 1960 ), Mariel for Cello and Marimba

Argentinian composer Osvaldo Golijov is best known for his orchestral and vocal works. His Jewish family immigrated to Argentina from Romania.  Among his numerous awards are a Guggenheim Fellowship, a MacArthur Fellowship and two Grammy Awards.  He also served as composer-in-residence for multiple orchestras and festivals.

Mariel for Cello and Marimba was written in 1999 “in memory of my friend Mariel Stubrin . . . [and attempts] to capture that short instant before grief, in which one learns of the sudden death of a friend,” says the composer.  Its intricate phrasing of Brazilian themes combines the two instruments in a lush duet.  

Caroline Shaw (b. 1982), Limestone and Felt for Cello and Percussion

American composer Caroline Shaw took up the violin at the age of two and graduated with a bachelor’s in violin performance from Rice University and a master’s in violin from Yale.  She won a Pulitzer Prize in 2013 for Partita for 8 voices and a Grammy Award for her Narrow Sea.

The title Limestone and Felt refers to contrasting surface textures.  In this piece, says the composer, she imagines herself in a Gothic cathedral where shards of melody bounce off the walls and intertwine. “Ultimately,” she says, “felt and limestone may represent two opposing ways we experience history and design our own present.”  

Program notes by Sara Grossman