José García-León, Dean
new music new haven
Aaron Jay Kernis, Artistic Director
Katherine Balch, faculty composer
&
Ezra Laderman, professor emeritus – in memory –
Thursday, October 10, 2024 | 7:30 p.m.
Morse Recital Hall in Sprague Memorial Hall
Program
Benjamin Webster
b. 1997
Kacper Madejek
b. 1999
Lily Koslow
b. 2001
Forrest Eimold
b. 1999
Four Airs
I. Free and wistful
II. Evenly and moderately
III. Very precise, energetic
IV. Longingly
Ben Smith, flute
Shred
I. Con moto
II. Con brio
III. Con fuoco
Robin Park, cello
Emmett Edwards, guitar
The Chiaroscurist: Five Contrasts for Pitch Black Night
I. À mauve ouvert – à McEwen
II. Abstraction verte – à Borduas
III. Autriche iii – à Riopelle
IV. Blanc sur blanc – à Tousignant
V. Ghost hills – à Ferron
Carter Johnson & Vitaly Strikov, pianos
Ad aurem
Laurel Gagnon & Miranda Werner, violin
Hayoung Moon & Hyunji Kim, cello
Forrest Eimold & Leo Gevisser, pianos intermission
Katherine Balch
b. 1991
Zihan Wu
b. 2001
Ezra Laderman 1924–2015
Obstenmelodie
Forrest Eimold, piano
Serenade for Sashekia
Yiran Zhao, soprano
Zihan Wu, piano
Remembrances of Ezra Laderman
Martin Bresnick, speaker
Elegy (for Stephen) for Solo Bassoon
Frank Morelli, bassoon
Partita for Solo Bassoon
V. Vivace (freely) quasi cadenza
VI. Moderato
Frank Morelli, bassoon
On Vineyard Sound
Benjamin Verdery, guitar
As a courtesy to others, please silence all devices. Photography and recording of any kind is strictly prohibited. Please do not leave the hall during musical selections. Thank you.
Artist Profiles
Katherine Balch, faculty composer
Called “spellbinding” (Seen and Heard International) with “glow and poise and electric tension” (The Daily Telegraph), the music of composer Katherine Balch captures the magic of everyday sounds, inviting audiences into a sonic world characterized by imagination, discovery, and textural lyricism. Inspired by the intimacy of quotidian objects, found sounds, and natural processes, she has been described as “some kind of musical Thomas Edison – you can just hear her tinkering around in her workshop, putting together new sounds and textural ideas” (San Francisco Chronicle).
Balch’s work has been commissioned and performed by leading ensembles including the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the New York Philharmonic, the London Sinfonietta, Ensemble Modern, and the symphony orchestras of Pittsburgh, Dallas, Minnesota, Oregon, Albany, Indianapolis, and Tokyo. She has been featured on IRCAM’s ManiFeste, Fontainebleau Music Festival, Festival MANCA in France, Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival in the UK, Suntory Summer Arts and Takefu Music Festival in Japan, and the Aspen, Norfolk, Santa Fe, and Tanglewood music festivals in the United States.
Deeply committed to pursuing inclusive, engaging pedagogical practices that empower students through creative music-making, Balch is currently Assistant Professor of Composition at the Yale School of Music. katherinebalch.com
Ezra Laderman, composer
Ezra Laderman (1924–2015) was a composer whose works included twelve string quartets, eleven concertos, and eight symphonies; six dramatic oratorios, music for dance, seven operas, and music for two Academy Award–winning films. In the words of Anthony Tommasini, “Mr. Laderman’s gruff, kinetic music mixes pungently atonal elements into a harmonic language that is tonally rooted and clearly directed.”
After joining the Yale School of Music community as a composer-in-residence in 1988, Laderman served as Dean from 1989 to 1995. Under his leadership, the Artist Diploma was added to the School’s degree programs in 1993. After his tenure as Dean, he served as Professor of Music until his retirement in 2014, when he was named Professor Emeritus.
Ezra Laderman was a leader of numerous professional organizations: he served as chair of the National Endowment for the Arts composer-librettist program, president of the American Music Center, director of the music program of the National Endowment for the Arts, president of the National Music Council, board chair of the American Composers Orchestra, and president of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He was the recipient of three Guggenheim fellowships and the Rome Prize, and had residencies at the Bennington Composers Conference, the American Academy in Rome, and the Rockefeller Foundation at Bellagio.
Student Profiles
Benjamin Webster, ’25DMA Student of Katherine Balch benwebstermusic.com
Kacper Madejek, ’25MM Student of Aaron Jay Kernis kacpermadejek.com
Lily Koslow, ’25MM Student of Aaron Jay Kernis
Forrest Eimold ’26DMA Student of David Lang
Zihan Wu, ’25MM Student of Martin Bresnick zihanwumusic.com
Staff manager
Jeffrey M. Mistri
music librarian
Marika Basagoitia
office assistant
Abby Smith
Program Notes
Four Airs
benjamin webster
Four Airs is a collection of pieces for solo flute that are based off of field recordings taken in and around New Haven, Connecticut. All parties involved in the creation of this work (myself the composer, as well as the four flutists commissioning the piece) have called New Haven “home” at some point or another in our lives, and I thought it would be meaningful to somehow embed the sounds of the city into the music itself. The title’s meaning is twofold; “air” not only refers to the musical term for song-like works (such as those by J. S. Bach or John Dowland), but of course the air that powers the flute and carried the original sounds off of which each movement is based.
Shred kacper madejek
This suite of short, virtuosic etudes for classical guitar and violoncello was inspired by my exploration of parametric approaches to frequency and duration in twentieth-century Hungarian music. Each movement draws upon the intensity, complexity, and showmanship of iconic electric guitarists, channeling that energy into the chamber acoustic medium.
The Chiaroscurist: Five Contrasts for Pitch Black Night lily koslow
A group of Québecois.es painters known as The Automatistes were inspired by the notion of surrealist automatism, emphasizing spontaneity of gesture and the unconscious mind in the creation process. What resulted from this fascination was an artistic movement rich with dynamic, abstract works, with each
Program Notes, cont.
painting offering striking contrasts of color and form. Through texture and harmony, I sought to translate these evocative visual contrasts into musical chiaroscuro. Each of the short pieces in the set was inspired by a different painting by artists Jean McEwen, Paul-Émile Borduas, Jean-Paul Riopelle, Marcelle Ferron, and Claude Tousignant.
Ad aurem
forrest eimold
“[Fauré’s] spirit is called upon by a vision, by an image[….] [It] permeates, the harmonics of emotion resound and rustle, and the fickle dreamer, seduced by their echo, lets themself get distracted and carried away.” (Reynaldo Hahn)
“Let us cast a nonchalant eye on the first page of [great composers’] work, and we are struck with a religious astonishment at the sight of these sinister processions of stern, sober, and strange signs.” (Stéphane Mallarmé)
This piece’s final section was written in memory of violinist Jane Song (2001–2016), with whom I played one of Fauré’s last works.
(translations by Christopher Lu)
Obstenmelodie
katherine balch
Obstenmelodie was written for my friend Tomoki Park as a companion piece to J. S. Bach’s Duet No. 2 in F major (Klavierübungen), from which it proceeds attacca but need not. Obstenmelodie is a poor translation of “grape-song.” I think of this short piece as a kind of sweet-andsour musical snack wherein the player is invited to juxtapose long, sustained melodic lines (stems) with playful,
punctuated clusters (grapes) using the sostenuto pedal, which sustains certain selected notes while others remain unaffected.
This piece was co-commissioned by Tomoki Park/ Sir András Schiff’s Building Bridges series and Lynn University’s Conservatory of Music.
Serenade for Sashekia zihan wu
The work consists of five songs that tell the story of the spiritual journey of a nightingale.
I
Nightingale
Sing alone with tears...
II
Cherry Blossom
Bloom...
Scatter scatter scatter... a Nightingale sings
III.
“Sing for me” “No!”
IV.
“What if the bird does not sing?”
“Kill it?”
“What if the bird does not sing?”
“Make it sing”
“What if...?”
“I will wait until it sings”
V.
(Song of the Nightingale - sings with tears)
Elegy (for Stephen) for Solo Bassoon, & Partita for Solo Bassoon
ezra laderman
Frank Morelli
Ezra Laderman afforded me the opportunity of a lifetime in 1994 when he, then Dean of YSM, invited me to join this prestigious faculty. I was given the daunting responsibility of continuing in the footsteps of my beloved teacher and Ezra’s dear friend, Stephen Maxym. Our shared affection for Stephen Maxym created a significant connection between Ezra and me early on. Within a few years I had performed his Concerto for Bassoon and Strings several times in its two versions, for bassoon and string quartet and bassoon and string orchestra (including bass).
On October 11, 2002, Stephen Maxym passed away. Tomorrow marks the 22nd anniversary of his death. A few days after, Ezra composed an Elegy for Solo Bassoon as a private statement of his grief over the loss of his friend. He sent a handwritten copy to Lucy Maxym, Stephen’s widow, with no thought that it might be performed. When I asked Ezra if we (his students) could perform it, he responded that the piece was Lucy’s and she should decide.
Luckily, she agreed. Lucy was well aware of how much we loved her late husband, and that we would wish to honor his memory with this beautiful work. I will also perform it on this stage on October 20, 2024, as part of my faculty recital, as I am this evening, in remembrance of the composer and our mutual friend.
I believe the Elegy, combined with my performances of the concerto, planted the seeds for the Partita in Ezra’s mind. Before Thanksgiving, 2012, I received a phone
call from Ezra. In his direct manner he pronounced that he expected me to be available on a certain date in early February 2013, to perform at Yale, stating something to the effect that “I’m writing you a solo work, and you’ll premiere it that night.” That was the first I heard of either the piece or the performance! Luckily I was available on the date that was already in YSM’s concert calendar. Ezra finished the Partita on Thanksgiving Day, 2012, at Woods Hole. I received a photocopy of the manuscript before the semester break. As I set out to learn the piece over the Christmas and New Year’s holidays, I felt deep gratitude for having been given such a completely unexpected gift. I subsequently recorded the Partita and Elegy in Sprague, as part of an album of Ezra’s later music for Albany Records, which also includes performances by our esteemed YSM colleagues Robert Blocker and Ole Akahoshi.
On Vineyard Sound
ezra laderman Ben Verdery
The first movement of Ezra Laderman’s On Vineyard Sound was an audition piece, and even in its nascent form, it garnered great attention and praise from guitarists. Laderman has remarked, “Its four movements reflect on some of the characteristics that make the guitar so unique. Each movement stays within a specific sound world, with the last section being an extension of the first movement. As with so many of my works, the opening phrase of each movement becomes the foundation for all that will follow. It lays out a sequence of notes that will be explored, transformed, and illuminated.”
Upcoming Events at YSM
oct 13 Wendy Sharp, violin Faculty Artist Series
3:00 p.m. | Morse Recital Hall
Free admission
oct 13 Yale Choral Artists
YSM Ensembles
4:00 p.m. | Christ Church
Free admission
oct 16 Lunchtime Chamber Music
12:30 p.m. | Morse Recital Hall
Free admission
oct 20 Frank Morelli, bassoon with Janna Baty, mezzo-soprano, and Wei-Yi Yang, piano Faculty Artist Series
3:00 p.m. | Morse Recital Hall
Free admission
oct 23 Lunchtime Chamber Music
12:30 p.m. | Morse Recital Hall
Free admission
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