Five Musical Tales, for orchestra (1998)
Five Musical Tales was written for the Seattle Youth Symphony Orchestra and its musical director Jonathan Shames in the Spring of 1998. Since composing for an orchestra of young players dictated certain aesthetic as well as technical constraints, I decided to use the idea of childhood as programatic clue. The Tales were conceived in the spirit of a “Divertissement.” Each of them relates to impressions given by a particular scene or place in the countryside in summer, as seen through the eyes of a child:
– 1. “Village Dance”: the child is watching peasants dancing heavily in the summer heat; hay is flying around, and every now and then the dancers miss a beat, which gives a comical twist to their choreography.
– 2.“The song of the stars”: the child is observing with wonder the night sky. In the dialogue between trumpet and bassoon, one can imagine the questions asked by the child and the answers of the stars. Soon, the child falls asleep.
– 3. “Festival”: the child is participating in a lively dance made up of many different rhythms with instrumental groups constantly interrupting each other.
– 4. “The song of the rain”: the soft melancholy of a day spent in the house, watching the rain falling outside.
– 5. “The song of the light”: this last movement is a celebration of the light and colors of a hot summer day; the child is playing outside again, in the brilliant heat of the midday sun.