Representative
pages Page Spiral bound 10 &1/2" by 13" Hard copy
$13 From DAPrint Premiere: June 7, 2005 by the Charleston
Chamber Music Society, for the Piccolo Spoleto Festival, Spotlight on
Contemporary Music Series at the City Gallery at Waterfront Park, Charleston,
SC. Performed by: Nancy Clayton Lefter, mezzo-soprano, Tacy Edwards,
flute; Liz Tomorsky, oboe; Jeanette Jonquil, clarinet; and Sandra Nikolajevs.
bassoon. Download Title
page, Text and Prgram notes Download
Clarinet part (in B-flat)
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Published: DAPrint,
Omaha NE Duration 12'
Full
Score sample
Piano
Page sample
This work is the direct result of a commission from the Charleston Chamber Music
Society, that is directed by two friends and associates of mine who are marvelous
musicians, who also frequently perform in their yearly series of concerts. The
work had to include 3 of my favorite performers ever, Tacy Edwards, flute, Liz
Tomorsky, oboe, and Sandra Nikolajevs, bassoon. They are all three delightful
'wierdos' who are totally in love with their instruments, and they play them
beautifully, and often.
In the summer of 2004 I was on the island of Bali for a month at a workshop,
listening, studying and performing Indonesian gamelan music and so much wanted
to bring back ideas for musical composition that incorporated the jangling sounds
that the Balinese seem to just swim in throughout their entire lives. Not wanting
to just arrange sounds, I waited until I could come up with an idea that incorporated
that effect that was within my compositional style. The opening melodic idea
is very typical of the kind of music that begins a gamelan composition, and
then much of the harmonic language is based upon chordal statements of this
idea.
I thought the text, a fun bit of sarcasm and irony by Lewis Carroll (of Alice
and Wonderland fame), was a delightful sardonic antidote to all the folks who
live here in Charleston (SC) who seem to be constantly affirming and then reaffirming
their love of the beaches and the ocean. I set the text as carefully as I could,
trying to reflect the author's good natured ribbing of the mighty ocean and
its environs.
Text
From PHANTASMAGORIA & OTHER POEMS
By Lewis Carroll, Drawing by Arthur B. Frost. Pub. MacMillian & Co Limited,
London 1911
THERE are certain things - as, a spider, a ghost,
The income-tax, gout, an umbrella for three -
That I hate, but the thing that I hate the most
Is a thing they call the Sea.
Pour some salt water over the floor -
Ugly I`m sure you`ll allow it to be:
Suppose it extended a mile or more,
That’s very like the Sea.
Beat a dog till it howls outright -
Cruel, but all very well for a spree:
Suppose that he did so day and night,
That would be like the Sea.
I had a vision of nursery-maids;
Tens of thousands passed by me -
All leading children with wooden spades,
And this was by the Sea.
Who invented those spades of wood?
Who was it cut them out of the tree?
None, I think, but an idiot could -
Or one that loved the Sea.
It is pleasant and dreamy, no doubt, to float
With `thoughts as boundless, and souls as free`:
But, suppose you are very unwell in the boat,
How do you like the Sea?
There is an insect that people avoid
(Whence is derived the verb `to flee`).
Where have you been by it most annoyed?
In lodgings by the Sea.
If you like your coffee with sand for dregs,
A decided hint of salt in your tea,
And a fishy taste in the very eggs -
By all means choose the Sea.
And if, with these dainties to drink and eat,
You prefer not a vestige of grass or tree,
And a chronic state of wet in your feet,
Then - I recommend the Sea.
For I have friends who dwell by the coast -
Pleasant friends they are to me!
It is when I am with them I wonder most
That anyone likes the Sea.
They take me a walk: though tired and stiff,
To climb the heights I madly agree;
And, after a tumble or so from the cliff,
They kindly suggest the Sea.
I try the rocks, and I think it cool
That they laugh with such an excess of glee,
As I heavily slip into every pool
That skirts the cold cold Sea.