Program Note: I have always considered Chicago to be aptly named. The name “Chicago” or “Checagou” as referenced by Robert de LaSalle is derived from a French rendering of the word shikaakwa of the Miami-Illinois Native American language. It loosely translates as “wild onion” or “wild garlic”. Beyond the actual garlic plants for which the […]
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A GREAT COMMERCIAL CITY
Click here to sample online and purchase from Cedille Records website. Also available from iTunes, Amazon, CD Baby, etc… Program Note: As a composer I have always found inspiration from places I have lived or experienced. Having called Chicago home for several years now and having spent my childhood growing up in the shadow of this […]
ARS POETICA
Ars Poetica: Text by Rebecca Morgan Frank, Editor-in-Cheif of Memorious, a journal of new verse and fiction. The oyster doesn’t mourn what is removed, or consider the cause of creation. It just keeps fashioning beauty, conception a mundane task. Invasion, injury transformed in brine, preserved in protein and aragonite layered over time. Instrumentation: voice and […]
ROOTS RUN DEEP (orchestra)
Program Note: In a conversation with my maternal grandfather (Pépère), he made an obvious and yet striking comment about his reality. “My roots run deep here.” He was referring to the Houle family farm, located in Vermont’s Northeast Kingdom on which he has lived virtually his entire life since he was born in 1921. For […]
MONKS MOUND
Program Note: Where we stand, have stood many others. Layers of unmentioned history lay dormant under our feet. What secrets have past civilizations left behind? Buried rooms filled with bones, passages with faded warnings, ghostly whispers leaking through the cracks in the sidewalks? There are mysteries that lay beneath the hubbub of our modern world. Monks […]
NOISE POLLUTION
Program Note: Noise pollution is most commonly manifested as construction or transportation sounds. In Chicago, we have our fair share of both. Noise Pollution originally written for the Anaphora Ensemble was completed in Chicago on Monday, November 8, 2010 with all subsequent revisions completed by the end of 2011. Instrumentation: Percussion, Flute/Alto Flute, Clarinet in […]