Featured Concert

February 8 2008, San Francisco
New American Chamber Music for Voice and Instruments
San Francisco Conservatory, Recital Hall

Program Highlights
4 Poems by Edna St. Vincent Millay for Coloratura Soprano and String Quartet(2008), Liam Wade

Concert Order

Program Notes
Seven Songs - Vartan Aghababian
The premiere of Seven Songs (2003) for soprano and string quartet took place in Cambridge, MA in March of 2003. Since that time, Ann has earnestly reiterated her intention to perform them again; tonight's concert is the realization of that intention. The cycle is based upon poetry by the British World War I poet Wilfrid Gibson. My work on this set of songs extended from April of 2002 to February of 2003; five years later, I still consider this cycle to be some of my best and favorite work. All of this I owe to my cherished friend and talented colleague, Ann Moss.

In late September 2001, Ann came to me with a project which I found to be, quite honestly, a remarkable vision: a song cycle employing serious and dark, if not downright disturbing, poetry. "I'm tired of singing about springtime and love and other such frivolities," Ann confided. She had already collected texts by various poets, one of which moved me so strongly by its content and construction that I was compelled to "claim" it immediately. I achieved this by lovingly threatening her with desperate consequences should she even so much as show it to another composer, and vowed to compose it for her in the spring. In the interim, I acquired the assistance of a capable (and attractive) librarian at the Boston Public Library who acquired for me the several dozen pages of texts by this British poet, then unknown to me. From these I selected ten, from which Ann and I chose and ordered the seven which make up the cycle.

The songs have been ordered to take the listener on a journey, beginning with the departure for war, continuing with the detailing of experiences abroad and at home, progressing to the experience of returning home, and finally providing a summarizing if not rhetorical conclusion. Keys and meters have been specifically chosen to provide contrast; some of the songs share certain characteristics,which help me to unite the group as a cycle, such as particular melodic contours (especially the rising interval of a major seventh) or the use of atetrachord based upon the pitch class set [ 0,3,4,5 ].

From the beginning of my friendship with Ann, I was aware of her ability to embrace the beauty and pain of poems such as these. Since working with her on these songs, what continually astounds me is her ability to convey their beauty, sorrow and loss so (seemingly) effortlessly.

Both Ann and I have long awaited the opportunity to present Seven Songs again in concert. I wish to thank Ann for her dedication to and faith in this cycle; I'd also like to acknowledge her work and the work of the string quartet -- thank you all for bringing Seven Songs to the performance hall once again. Lastly, I wish to repeat my closing note of gratitude as expressed in the program notes from the concert on which this cycle received its premiere performance: Ann, I thank you for being such a personal and artistic inspiration to me, and for your unending enthusiasm and belief in me.
~ Vartan Aghababian

Four Poems by Edna St. Vincent Millay for String Quartet and Coloratura Soprano - Liam Wade
It all began when, in the summer of ’07, I was invited to have dinner with Ann Moss and her parents at their home in Lincoln, MA. That evening Ann suggested that she would like to collaborate with me on a concert yet to be planned, and things were set in motion. In October, Ann called from California to say that she was organizing a concert involving string quartet and voice; this just happens to be my favorite ensemble for which to compose.

With the ensemble decided upon, the next step in my process was to design the piece from the lyrics down. Ann wanted a beautiful piece, so we chose poetry by Edna St. Vincent Millay; her name itself sounds like a sweet melody! Ann and I read through hundreds of poems and found two we really liked: Burial and The True Encounter. Halloween night found us sitting on my couch in Somerville, MA when Ann pointed out to me that both poems had lines about being devoured by animals. If we could find another poem with this motif, we would have our piece. We landed on Hyacinth, a poem about unrequited love, jealousy and passion, which contains a line about mice gnawing upon bulbs, just like the jealousy gnawing at the poet's heart.

I wrote the music for The True Encounter, Burial and Hyacinth in November during two visits to my parents’ house in Philadelphia. The True Encounter, a poem about a girl who cries, “Wolf!”, spoke to me of the fiery courtship between young lovers, simultaneously afraid of and enraptured by one another. I composed Hyacinth as an energetic tango, giving it a sexy charge, hot with passion. I placed an underlying presence of jealous anxiety, embodied in the 1st violin’s thrashing about in e flat minor as everyone else dances along in a minor. In Burial Millay speaks of her desire to find her final place of rest under the ocean. I ordered it third to suggest a parting of ways with the chaotic entanglements of young, unreasonable love; a funeral waltz for the living.

Upon finishing the first three songs, I felt an uneasiness about ending the cycle here, and so, with Ann's permission, I went in search of a fourth poem. The text of Recuerdo depicts two people who find happiness and a sense of arrival after a long journey. It was the happy ending that I wanted for this cycle. In Recuerdo, instead of being devoured by animals or emotions, a couple eats apples and pears, finding nourishment after a long journey. They have all that they need in one another. They have traveled hard, and now they have arrived. Having just moved all of my worldly possessions from Massachusetts to California, I knew just how they felt. I finished this piece in my new home of San Diego, feeling very tired and very merry.
~ Liam Wade

Knoxville: Summer of 1915 - Samuel Barber, arranged by Patrick Lawrence
There's not a whole lot to say about this arrangement. I stayed very true to both the orchestral version (transferring most of the v1, v2, va and vc material directly into my arrangement) and Barber's piano arrangement (relying heavily on the piano only version to arrange the piano part in my arrangement). The orchestral version repeatedly uses the effect of two 'choirs', one of strings and one of brass /winds (just look at the introduction before the first theme as a prime example), and I transferred that into contrasting the choir of 'strings' to the choir of 'piano'. I hope you see what I'm getting at. Of course there were a million little decisions to make along the way, but that was the essence of the project.

Knoxville is SUCH an intimate piece, and I think the best decision I made was the very first one: to arrange it for chamber ensemble. The chamber version is so much more colourful than piano only (not Barber's fault of course), and being more intimate than the orchestral version I think it compares very favourably. Of course, you can't beat a full orchestra (especially when it comes to singing in front of one), but the chamber setting really does feel like a valid reinterpretation of the work (not just what you do when you don't have an orchestra).
~ Patrick Lawrence

Vocalise - JooWan Kim
Vocalise (2007) was written at various Berkeley tea shops and local libraries. I don't generally write at the piano (unless I am writing for piano and I have to play the part). It is a piece that reflects my "pretty" period (which I am in right now); nevertheless it is written with great intellectual vigor, which you may or may not be able to hear.

Ann and Kristal were colleagues of mine at the San Francisco Conservatory. Both had requested a piece from me within the last year, and somewhat foolishly, I promised them each that I would write something for them. Then I had the brilliant idea to combine the task of writing two different pieces, and compose a piece that would feature both of them. I hope they are happy with the result.

I would like to add that it feels pretty gran-tastic to go to the dark side and write music that sounds sort of like tonal music. I think I am going to try to keep it that way until... I become filthy rich. Then, of course, I will return to my true self: a chaotic self doubting artist who writes, breathes, eats, drinks and defecates dissonance.
~JooWan Kim

Étude for Soprano and Harp: The Dream of Autumn After Rain - Jacob Bertrand

When I first wrote this piece I gave it the title Vocalise for Soprano and Harp. It seemed the logical choice for an accompanied vocal piece not based on any specific text. I gave the score to Ann and she had it for a little while before calling me one day and suggesting that I change the title to Étude for Soprano and Harp. Immediately I knew what she meant. Vocalise, in both of our minds, brought with it a great deal of Romantic weight that was not necessarily reflected in my piece. The piece was much more an etude, a study. So I changed the title, only to learn subsequently that the vocalise is, traditionally, a vocal exercise or study without words. Whether or not the piece is a traditional vocalise or an étude, the point is that it is a study from both compositional and performance perspectives. Compositionally, the study was how to craft a meaningful melodic vocal line (without text as a guide) around a strictly harmonically-conceived, pattern-driven, minimalist accompaniment. For the vocalist, in addition to the technical aspects of the piece, the study is then how to realize that line, how to give it movement and direction and meaning. For the harpist, the piece is a study in executing repetitive figurations and, also, one in endurance, as there is no break in the harp part for the entire length of the piece. Structurally the piece can be broken down into three sections: a long first section which takes up, roughly, the first two-thirds of the piece; a second section which reintroduces and varies material from the first section; and a short third section which serves as a coda and further deconstructs material from the first two sections. Although there is no sung text in this piece, it, like other pieces on this program, did draw upon words for inspiration. The subtitle, "The Dream of Autumn after Rain", is taken from the poem of the same name by C. Dale Young. The piece is not intended to be programmatic or musically representative of the poem in any way, but rather to evoke the overall mood of the poem.

Performers

Steven Bailey is a pianist of wide versatility, performing in and outside the San Francisco Bay Area as soloist, chamber and collaborative keyboardist. He accompanied mezzo-soprano Elza van den Heever at the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC as part of the Center’s “Conservatory Project”. Their performance can be seen on webcast at the Kennedy Center website. Steven Bailey has performed as concerto soloist with the Diablo Symphony, UC-Davis Symphony, San Francisco Concerto Orchestra, and Magnificat Baroque Orchestra. He is a regular guest as fortepianist on original period instruments at the American Bach Soloists’ Summerfest chamber music performances, and performed with ABS in March as co-harpsichordist. He has collaborated with members of the Alexander, Arlekin and Sausalito quartets. He provided live musical accompaniment for SMUIN Ballet’s production of “Stravinsky Piano Pieces” and was featured on the San Francisco variety program “Mornings on Two” on the FOX Network. He is the regular continuo player for the San Francisco Bach Choir. Steven Bailey’s first solo CD recording, “The Art of the Opera Transcription”, features seven virtuosic operatic fantasies and paraphrases composed by the master Franz Liszt. He was recording producer and musical editor of the San Francisco Bach Choir’s latest CD offering, “Ceremonies and Celebrations”, released in December 2002. Mr. Bailey holds a Master of Music degree in Piano performance from Boston University. He teaches at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music.

Harpist Kristal Schwartz has been performing professionally for over 10 years. She is a recent graduate of San Francisco Conservatory of Music, where she was awarded her Masters in Performance with Honors. Alongside work with several up and coming composers, she is currently in the process of recording an album, preparing for solo concerts, and performing for many Bay Area private events, weddings and parties. When she is not performing she is a nanny for 4 kids and pursuing a research project in
musical aesthetics and cultural studies.

JooWan Kim was born in Pusan, South Korea, 1978. Despite his natural talent for music, JooWan did not pursue music seriously until 1997. Prior to that, he had was one of the top academic students at An-Yang high school. In the fall of 1997, Kim met professor Hun Sunwoo at Kang-Nam University and started his initial training in harmony and composition. As his family wasn't able to afford lessons from a college professor, JooWan planned to work to pay for his lessons. However, after listening to his improvisations on the piano, professor Sunwoo started giving lessons free of charge. In 1998 JooWan came to San Francisco, and about a year later received a scholarship for composition and piano performance from the Berklee College of Music, Boston, MA, where he graduated with honor (summa cum laude) in 2003. While attending the Berklee College of Music, JooWan began to practice Sundo(Korean Taoist Internal Alchemy) and Traditional Rinzai Zen at the Sixth Patriarch Zen Center in Berkeley, where he resided from 1998 to 2004, under the guidance of Venerable Hyunoong Sunim. This experience made a huge influence on JooWan's personal and musical development. In 2004, he conceived the "Book of Mik Nawooj (2004-2005)", a musical Taoist mythology which depicts the main character's pursuit of the ultimate power. The suite consists of 5 pieces that are varied in styles, genres and instrumentation. It includes a string orchestra, fusion octet with a rapper, duet with electronics, and two chamber orchestras. From 2004-2006, JooWan attended the San Francisco Conservatory of Music with a scholarship in composition, earning a Masters Degree. While at the Conservatory, he composed for various soloists, ensembles and orchestras. In 2005, he formed Ensemble Mik Nawooj, which consists of flute, clarinet, violin, cello, piano, drum set, bass and an emcee. It was for this ensemble that Kim wrote the "Great Integration", the next chapter for "Book of Mik Nawooj". Upon graduation, JooWan signed a management contract with the Jazz Legend Ahmad Jamal. Joowan's genuine love for classical, hip-hop, jazz, film score and many other genres, in conjunction with his training in traditional Western European composition and Taoist Buddhist spiritual disciplines, creates a unique sound that separates him from most other musicians. Kim believes that the world is going through a profound alchemical change right now, and his music reflects this "Great Integration". JooWan lives in Berkeley, CA and can be found at local fine tea shops, drinking tea, meditating, or composing.JooWan Kim is a Steinway Artist.