New Works on PSNY: Wollschleger, Ueno and Cerrone

by Ted Gordon on Oct. 27, 2015, 11:31 a.m.

PSNY is pleased to announce the addition of several major works from three of our composers, ranging from pieces for solo clarinet to a new work for piano and string orchestra. Four of these new works by Scott Wollschleger, Ken Ueno and Christopher Cerrone were composed and premiered within the past year. 

Scott Wollschleger's Soft Aberration No. 2, for piano and viola, explores Wollschleger's concept of a "broken echo"—imitation between instruments that is refracted and softened by the act of communication in performance. Meditative and insightful, this work illustrates the diffusion of tonality with expressive, lyrical harmonies in the piano that are echoed in the viola's muted melodies. 

As in Soft Aberration No. 2, Wollschleger's Meditation on Dust presents the listener with a transfigured aural landscape of tonality through expressive, gestural motifs—though in this piece the piano is accompanied by a full string orchestra. Wollschleger imagines Straussian tone-poems petrifying in the desert, taken out of their fin-de-siècle Viennese context and into the future, where they still sound through a layer of dust. This isn't a "dusting" of tonality; rather, it is expressive tonality rendered into granules—pulverized, decayed, transfigured into an enigmatic refrain. Check out a video of pianist Karl Larson with the String Orchestra of Brooklyn premiering the work in June: 

In addition to these works by Wollschleger, we're very happy to make available three works by Ken Ueno, all of which embody Ueno's innovative use of extended techniques, multiphonics, and bold compositional voice. Ueno's Watt, for baritone saxophone, percussion, and CD Boombox, is an early example of Ueno's journey into multiphonics. Taking inspiration from John Coltrane's late albums such as Interstellar Space (1967), Watt shows Ueno's reconciliation of multiple symbolic, timbral, and functional systems into a kind of "flow", which he likens to a "manifold—like playing Scrabble and Mahjong at the same time."

Another work that features a reed instrument, this time a solo amplified Bb clarinet, is I screamed at the sea until nodes swelled up, then my voice became the resonant noise of the sea. The title of this piece comes from lore from the Korean tradition of Pansori singing, in which it is said that singers develop their trademark vocal timbre by screming at the sea until they develop nodes in their vocal chords. Ueno's work explores this idea through the clarinet, developing new techniques for overblowing, multiphonics, and the limits of humans and machines. 

Ueno's interest in reed instruments, multiphonics, extended techniques, electronics, and the limits of sound, all come together in his stunning 2015 concerto for violin and chamber ensemble, Zetsu. This work not only asks its performers to push the boundaries of what is possible with their instruments—it also asks them to play new instruments designed by the composer, such as percussion idiophones tuned to the microtonal intervals particular to the piece's harmonic spectrum, and the "hookah sax"—a saxophone with a 7-ft length of plastic tubing that extends its range. Check out a video of the premiere below:  

Finally, we are pleased to publish Christopher Cerrone's new song cycle, The Naomi Songs, in two versions: for voice and piano, and voice and 11 players. This cycle sets the poetry of Bill Knott, an enigmatic poet whose works were often short, metrical, and deeply self-depricating. In 1968, two years after announcing his own death, he published The Naomi Poems, a short volume that he often gave away for free and circulated via mimeograph. Cerrone's settings of these deeply personal poems matches their affect: the Naomi Songs are unified by the key of F, though their mode switches, and each song expresses a different aspect of joy, melancholy, longing, and desire. Check out an excerpt below: 

The Works of John Duffy on PSNY

by Ted Gordon on July 14, 2015, 11:42 a.m.

John Duffy is a towering figure in American composition, having composed over 300 works for symphony orchestra, chamber ensemble, film and television, opera, and theater. Born in 1926, Duffy is of a generation of American composers who helped define what it means to be a composer in the 21st century. Having studied with American greats, such as Copland, Cowell, but also European modernists such as Dallapiccola, Duffy pursued a compositional tack that melded direct, emotional writing with a unique sense of modernity.

In 1974, Duffy founded Meet the Composer, the pioneering organization that brought contemporary American composition into the homes of millions of Americans. Supporting programs that would engage composers with their audiences, Meet the Composer partnered with over 4,000 artistic and civic organizations to engage over 7,000 living composers with communities in all 50 states. Over its 37-year tenure as an independent organization, Meet the Composer had already fundamentally changed the face of American composition before merging with the American Music Center to become New Music USA, which continues its heritage. 

In addition to Meet the Composer, John Duffy founded the John Duffy Composers Institute at the Virginia Arts Festival in 2004. The Duffy Institute has supported the development of new operas by young composers, providing a platform for workshop performances of dozens of new works. Several PSNY composers have been involved with the Institute, including Christopher Cerrone and Gregory Spears.

Many of Duffy's works are available through Schott Music, including his recent opera, Black Water, as well as many orchestral and large-scale works. But here at PSNY, we're pleased to make available several of Duffy's chamber works for direct digital download. Beginning with a curated selection of five of his works from across the decades, we will be posting more works in the coming year. 

Duffy's 1971 Variations, for french horn, violin, viola, and cello, shows the composer exploring the possibilities of both rhythmic and melodic variations while still keeping the music full of humor, direct emotion, and a clarity of purpose. This playfulness is seen again in his 1975 Toccata and Fugue, for piccolo and percussion. Old forms are made new again in his 1990 Heritage Suite, which sees the composer evoking historical dances while making a thoroughly contemporary statement. Finally, Duffy's 2005/9 piece, We Want Mark Twain! is an evocative and dramatic piece for string quartet and narrator. 

We hope that you will have a chance to explore Duffy's works both on PSNY and through Schott Music, especially as we gear up to celebrate his 90th birthday in 2016! 

Christopher Cerrone in Los Angeles, Albany, Charleston, and more...

by Ted Gordon on May 19, 2015, 4:50 p.m.

Just after being awarded this year's prestigious Rome Prize, PSNY composer Christopher Cerrone has a slew of performances and premieres throughout the US before heading off to Italy. Last Friday, May 15th, saw the premiere of Cerrone's Four Naomi Songs at EMPAC, as a part of the composer collective Sleeping Giant's residency. Performed by The Dogs of Desire, the Albany Symphony Orchestra's resident new music ensemble, along with vocalist Theo Bleckmann, Cerrone's songs were accompanied by contributions from the other composers in the collective—which includes Timo Andres, Andrew Norman, Ted Hearne, Jacob Cooper, and Robert Honstein. Check out a preview of the Naomi Songs, with Cerrone, Bleckmann, and Andres, here: 

Coming up next is Cerrone's premiere of The Pieces That Fall to Earth by the LA Philharmonic on May 26th. Commissioned by the LA Philharmonic, the piece is a symphonic setting of poems by Kay Ryan. The premiere takes place as part of the LA Phil's Green Umbrella series and will be conducted by John Adams with soprano Hila Plitmann as soloist. 

Rounding out Cerrone's activities in May, The Living Earth Show will be performing his Double Happiness, along with Timo Andres' You Broke It, You Bought It and Adrian Knight's Family Man at the Spoleto USA Festival on May 28th. Check out the band performing Andres' piece at San Francisco's Mission Science Workshop below.