Why did you choose to create a composition based on Edgar Allan Poe’s "The Bells"? What was the inspiration?
This interesting and heavily onomatopoeic poem by Poe had always captured my attention. I happened to be at the time between commissions and was able to compose for my own personal interest. My wife Lisa and I were browsing through an old book of Poe’s poems at home and this poem stood ready to be set to music, so I immediately started sketching the music thinking of Colleen’s voice and her dramatic talent.
When you are commissioned to compose a piece, where do you start? Can you take us through the steps (broadly)? In composing the Magnificat, what presented the biggest challenges?
A commission sometimes may originate from an institution, but also it comes from a person or a family as a gesture to memorialize a loved one, or to mark a celebration or a special event. Commissions start with a conversation in which I learn about the motivation that inspired the initiative to commission this music. We talk about the format, instrumentation, if it includes text, part of the process is selecting a poem or collection of poems that fit the purpose. Then after obtaining the permissions for the text, the sketching starts, usually by then I know who will be performing this work. The piece is then composed with the performer/s in mind. The person or family commissioning the work receives periodical updates and at the end they receive copies of the printed and bound music, autographed, on special archival paper. All future copies of this music permanently include the name of the person, family or institution who commissioned it, and the dedication. One instance I had the request to print the music in such a way that it could be easily framed and displayed.
Magnificat is a good example of an institutional commission, in which the University of Sevilla (Spain) commissioned the piece for their choir and orchestra. In that case, the conductor of the choir and orchestra provided me with information about the size and skill level of the choir, the size and skill level of the orchestra, and the circumstance of the concert in which it would be premiered. I was also furnished with the required length, the Latin text, and the contact information for the soloists that would be performing it. I received a deadline in which the scores had to be delivered for rehearsals, and with those parameters, the work started.
The biggest challenge for Magnificat was composing such large work for eleven movements for choir, orchestra and soloists in record time, as the concert was already scheduled and advertised before a single note was yet composed. Three months after the initial conversation, the first draft of scores was delivered to the choir and soloists to start learning them. The premiere took place after two months of rehearsals.
What are you working on now?
Currently I am very excited to say that I am composing one, and possibly two pieces especially for this concert at St. Louis. One of the pieces will work with the theme of the concert and will represent the beginning of life. This piece of music is being set to a poem by Rabindranath Tagore titled “The Beginning” and it will be composed especially for Colleen and premiered at this concert.
The second piece is still in the conversation process. If the technical aspects allow, I would like to write a piece of music that would incorporate the new bells of St. Louis’ Church in the music, to be premiered at the concert with Colleen’s voice, the bells of St. Louis’ Church, and piano, but we are still debating if this is actually possible.
At the same time, I have received two composition grants from the teaching institution “Levine Music” in which I am a faculty member, the first one to compose piano repertoire for traditional piano students, and the second grant targeting jazz piano students. I am already working on this commission for the academic year 2020-2021 and several pieces have already been added to the portfolio.