Two Songs for the OPP by Paul Blackburn

I.

Stay drunk!
that's my motto. 
Then you'll never have to know
if the girl love you or no
                                      (hee   hee hee
                                       nor will she

II.

Play gui-
tar, go to the bar
hope there's one hand will caress
and undress
But pints to go
before you sleep
                                    (har,   har,
                                     nobody care

Nikki Einfeld, Soprano
Left Coast Chamber Ensemble
Matilda Hofman, Conductor

Brooklyn Narcissus

Two Songs for the OPP for Soprano and Ensemble (2022)

Written for the New Mexico Contemporary Ensemble

Sounds like if Bruckner wrote a New Orleans funeral dirge in the style of DuFay

Fauxbourdon after Ellington for Open Instrumentation (2022)

Sharon Harms, Soprano
The Lyris String Quartet

Text by Fernando Pessoa
Translations by the composer

Link to text:
https://static1.squarespace.com/static/604e5a25dad32a12b2420c4a/t/65da47a1667b19235f71e5fe/1708804001702/CDD+-+Text+%26+Notes+Only.pdf

Intervalo X

Intervalo VIII - In Memoriam Big Bob

MOVEMENT IV - Intervalo VII

Canção II

MOVEMENT II - Intervalo III

Intervalo II

Introdução - Tabacaria

Nine Songs for Contralto, Organ, Viola, & Cello
Emily Marvosh, Contralto

Text:
In the desert sun
in Arizona,
A yellow railroad caboose

Desert Sun, Yellow

Nine Songs for Contralto, Organ, Viola, & Cello
Emily Marvosh, Contralto

Text:
"You and me"
I sang
Looking at the cemetery

You & Me

Forms & Doubles plays with two ideas. Each Form deals with the constraints of jazz, particularly the formal constraints of the Great American Songbook. Each Double harkens further back in musical history, growing out of the Baroque “double” or “echo” movement. All kinds of material from the Form (pitch, rhythm, timbre, structure) is re-imagined in its Double. Double II is a Feldman-esque melody for my friend, musician Phil Acimovic. Double III is an icy, humorous miniature which owes its style (and subtlety) to my friend, musician Bryce Cannell. 

	Forms & Doubles was commissioned by Ellen Ruth Rose and Tod Brody of Earplay. The score is dedicated to them.

Double III - Swingiature For Bryce

Double I

Form I

Written for Genevieve Lee

Text by Guillaume Apollinaire

POEM READ AT THE MARRIAGE OF ANDRÉ SALMON

Seeing the flags this morning I didn't say to myself
Those are the rich garments of the poor
Nor does democratic modesty wish to veil from me its grief
Nor does the honoring of liberty require now that one imitate
The newspapers O fertile liberty O sole earthly liberty
Nor do houses flame because people are going away never to return
Nor with these hurried hangs work for us tomorrow
Nor even have those men been hung who cannot make a go for life
Nor even is the world made over by retaking the Bastille
I know that only those will remake the world who are rooted in poetry
Paris is decked out in flags because my friend André Salmon is to be married here

We met in some miserable cellar
During the years of our youth
Both of us smoking and awaiting the dawn in ragged clothes
Concerned with the same words whose meaning will have to be changed
Deceived deceived poor boys and not yet knowing how to laugh
The table and two glasses became a dying man who regarded us with Orpheus' last look
The glasses fell and broke
And we learned how to laugh
We left then pilgrims of perdition
Across streets across countries across reason
I saw him again on the shore of the river on which Ophelia floated
And the lasting whiteness of lotus flowers
He went away among wan Hamlets
Playing tunes of folly on a flute
I saw him beside a dying moujik reciting the beatitudes
Admiring the snow which was like naked women
I saw him doing this or that in honor of the same words
Which changes children's expressions and I am saying everything
Recollection and Prediction because my friend André Salmon is being married

Let us rejoice not because our friendship has been the stream which enriched us
River lands whose fertility is the nourishment all hope for
Nor because our glasses cast at us again Orpheus' dying look
Nor because we have grown so much that many people mistake our eyes for stars
Nor because the flags flap outside the windows of citizens who have been content for a hundred years to have life and petty things to defend
Nor because rooted in poetry we have rights over the words which make and unmake the world
Nor because we can cry without ridicule and because we know how to laugh
Nor because we smoke and drink as in the old days
Let us rejoice because the director of fire and poets
Love which like light fills
All solid space between the stars and planets
Love desired that my friend André Salmon should get married toda

Á La Tienne! (2023) for Speaking Pianist

Missa Brevis is an abstract mass for bass clarinet and double bass. Each movement of the mass takes structural cues from the repertory of the early Renaissance. While strict, the organic nature of my timbral, rhythmic, and modal writing develop throughout the five movements. The Credo is modeled after Ockeghem’s Missa Prolationum. The Agnus Dei is a deeply personal counterpoint that I have written for my late double bass teacher, the great Homer Mensch.

Performed by the Left Coast Chamber Ensemble

I. Kyrie

II. Gloria

III. Credo - Inventio Prolationum for Ockeghem

IV. Sanctus

V. Agnus Dei - Contrapunctus for Mr. Mensch

21V - Chorus
Martín Benvenuto - Conductor 

Program Note:

Two Partsongs was commissioned by Martín Benvenuto and 21V, in honor of César Chavez and Dolores Huerta. I am currently fascinated with the concept of doubles and mirrors. Setting two different poets in two different languages to honor two different people came to me immediately. The first text I chose is the passage from Goethe’s Faust, in which angels tell him to recreate the world in a more beautiful way. I had to find an appropriate double to this text, which invites us to create a new world as we see fit. To double the Goethe, I have selected Rubén Darío’s De Otoño. In this poem, someone asks a tree why they are no longer happy. One can imagine Faust as the tree, completely apathetic to the new world they created. “Let the hurricane move my heart.”

Two Partsongs are brief settings of the text below. The Darío is for three-part treble voices, and the Goethe for double that. The settings are homophonic, in keeping with the tradition of partsongs.

II. Choir of Spirits from Goethe's Faust

I. De Otoño

Brooklyn Narcissus I for Soprano (2017)

A Concertino for Trombone and Ensemble.

"Pack up all my care and woe
Here I go, singing low
Bye-bye, blackbird"

2017-05-11: Noon Concert, Works by graduate student composers

Sing Low for Trombone and Ensemble (2017)

Er-Gene Kahng - Violin
Christian Baldini - Conductor
Camellia Symphony Orchestra

"Like the lights of home before me
Or an angel, who's watching over me
This will be my shining hour
'Till I'm with you again"

- Johnny Mercer

Sing High for Violin and Orchestra

Sing High for Violin and Orchestra (2018)

Sharon Harms - Soprano
James Baker - Conductor
Conference Ensemble

Poem by Paul Blackburn
Copyright © by Joan Blackburn.

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/55511/brooklyn-narcissus

Brooklyn Narcissus II for Soprano and Chamber Orchestra (2019)

Beethausenstro - Castockhoven for Two Pianos & Auxiliary Percussion (2020)

Program Notes:

Diabelli’s commission for a single variation from Beethoven yielded thirty-three variations; a set of variations that attempt to best Bach’s Goldberg. Receiving a similar commission from HereNowHear, founded to perform Stockhausen’s Mantra, I knew I wanted to compose more than one variation, but as an opponent to “best” I decided to focus on beating the Beethoven of Rage, who was younger than I am when he composed it. How does one best a Beethoven not quite thirty? What do I know that he did not? I know late Beethoven and Mantra.

Stockhausen has said of Mantra that it begins with the shortest introduction in the history of music. Finding this statement ridiculous, I decided to expand his introduction, which is a small rhythmic cell that grows proportionately to itself. The cell, in theory, could go on forever. Beethausenstro—Castockhoven is an amalgam of Stockhausen’s Mantra introduction with Beethoven’s Rage and late style.

Beethausenstro—Castockhoven is scored for two pianos with auxiliary percussion. It is a set of three variations that cycle strictly through the opening sixty-four bars of Rage. The first variation is a prelude to the second, a fugue. The fugue is composed in the style of late Beethoven, considering as a model the fugue from Hammerklavier. The final variation acts as a postlude, slowly becoming the opening harmonic framework of Rage. The title of my work builds from a Stockhausen work, Beethausen—Stockhoven. I am grateful to Ryan McCullough and Andrew Zhou for this opportunity to write for them. Happy 250th birthday to Ludwig van Beethoven, that sweet creature of bombast.

Beethausenstro - Castockoven for Two Pianos (2020)

Chris Castro is a composer, double bassist, theorist, and educator residing in Southern California. He is a recipient of the 2023 Fromm Music Foundation Commission from Harvard University and Chamber Music America's 2021 Classical Commissioning Award. His music has been described as "on par with Varèse" (anonymous CMA juror) and “at once celebratory and solemn” (San Francisco Classical Voice). His music draws from the rich tradition of Western Art Music, from Johannes Ockeghem's Missa Prolationum to John Coltrane's Ascension. As a new music advocate, Chris serves on the artistic advisory board for the Left Coast Chamber Ensemble, New Mexico Contemporary Ensemble, and will be premiering two solo double bass works written for him by Phil Acimovic and Linda Catlin Smith in the fall of 2024. Chris holds degrees from the Juilliard School (double bass and composition) and a PhD from the University of California, Davis in composition and music theory. He lectures for the Los Angeles Philharmonic's Upbeat Live series. He is an Assistant Professor of Composition at Chapman University. 

Website: https://www.chriscastrocomposer.com

Contact: crcastro36@gmail.com

Selected list of works:
Dispositio for alto flute, English horn, piano, electric guitar, viola, and double bass (2025)
Four Partsongs from Babel for SSAATTBB Chorus (2025)
Lines II - Missa Sine Nomine for Trombone, Electric Guitar, Accordion, Violin, and Contrabass (2025)
Missa Brevis for Bass Clarinet and Double Bass (2024)
Tumba for Alto Flute, Cello, and Well-Tempered Clavier (2024)
Lines for Flute(s), Percussion, Harp, Viola, & Cello (2024)
Forms & Doubles for Flute(s) and Viola (2024)
Two Partsongs for Treble Voices (2024)
Canções dos Desassossego (Songs of Disquiet) for Soprano and String Quartet (2023)
Á la tienne! for Speaking Pianist (2023)
Eight Pops & A Center Pop for Contralto, Viola, Cello, and Organ (2023)
Snow White & Rose Red for Storyteller and Orchestra (2023)
Two Songs & Two Doubles for Voice and Well-Tempered Clavier (2023)
Miroirs Obscurcis for Well-Tempered Clavier (2023)
1722 for Open Instrumentation (2022)
Fauxbourdon After Ellington for Open Instrumentation (2022)
Two Songs for the OPP (from Brooklyn Narcissus) for Soprano and Chamber Ensemble (2022)
Clock-a-clay for Piano Trio (2021)
Beethausenstro - Castockhoven for Two Pianos (2020)
La for Alto Flute, Bass Clarinet, and Viola (2019)
Brooklyn Narcissus II for Soprano and Chamber Orchestra (2019)
Coyote Goes To The Sky & Birds Of Fortune: Two Stories for Storyteller, Flute, Cello, and Percussion (2019)
Sing High for Violin and Orchestra (2018)
Easy & Sad for Seven players (2018)
Choruses IV for String Quartet (2017)
IV - I for Two Pianos (2017)
Choruses III for Chamber Orchestra (2017)
Music for the short-film 'Postmodern Love' (2017)
A Drinking Song for SATB Choir (2017)
Brooklyn Narcissus I for Solo Soprano (2017)
Sing Low for Trombone and Ensemble (2017)
Choruses II for Violin and Piano (2016)
Ruines for Flute and Chamber Ensemble (2016)
Cavatine for Orchestra (2016)
Nocturne for Flute, Clarinet, Cello (2015)
Scherzo for Flute, Oboe, Clarinet (2015)
Cavatine for Solo Cello (2015)
Variations on an Original Theme for Clarinet, Violin, and Piano (2015)
Choruses I for String Quartet (2015)
Storm Fear for Mezzo-soprano and Piano (2014)
Poseidon's Steeds for Women's Choir and Organ (2014)
Movement for Piano (2014)
Etude for Percussion and Electronics (2013)
Fantasy on a Theme of James Bassi (backwards) for Flute, Clarinet, Violin, Viola, and Cello (2013)
Maw for String Quartet (2012)
Brooklyn Hymn-Variations for Saxophone Ensemble (2012)
Song of Quietness for SATB Chorus (2012)
Hymn and Fuguin' Tune for Cello Duo (2011)
When Jesus Wept (After Billings) for Brass Quintet (2011)
Monolith (A Symphonic Sketch) for Orchestra (2010)
Kyrie for SATB Chorus (2010)
Burn Like Roman Candles for Big Band (2009)
Suite for Double Bass (2008)
Nothing for String Quartet (2008)
Essay for Orchestra (2007)

Chris Castro

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