This is a live recording of composer Geoffrey Gordon's work for solo harp, Jeux de Création, commissioned for Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra principal harp, Anne-Sophie Bertrand. The studio recording of this work will be released on the Naxos label (the CD will also be called Jeux de Création) in October 2021.

PROGRAM NOTES:
Jeux de Création, for solo harp, takes inspiration from the aesthetic sound world of the 1920’s, as seen through the lens of the composer’s own contemporary classical language. Thematic material drawn from two landmark works of the era - Claude Debussy’s Jeux and Darius Milhaud’s La Création du Monde – are woven into the fabric of this expressive modern score of eight virtuoso minutes. Extended techniques, including xylophonics, harmonics, palm clusters and flutter glissandi, are interwoven with more traditional harp gestures to draw a vivid portrait of musical creation games.

Geoffrey Gordon
17 May 2021

***************

“Jeux de Création by the American composer Geoffrey Gordon is a brilliant, even spectacular work in all respects.”

- Pizzicato (November 2021)


"French-American harpist Anne-Sophie Bertrand plays a diverse program of music for harp, going back as far as E.T.A. Hoffmann, the older colleague and promoter of Beethoven, and as far forward as American composer Geoffrey Gordon.

Absolutely the most interesting piece on this entire album is Gordon’s Jeux de Création, music that is not just modern but very creative and highly atmospheric."

- The Art Music Lounge (November 2021)

GORDON - Jeux de Création for solo harp

This is a studio recording of composer Geoffrey Gordon's new work for tenor trombone and piano, Vermilion, after the painting by Henri Matisse, with soloist Yu Tamaki Hoso and pianist Kosuke Akimoto, recorded in Tokyo, 28 August 2021.

PROGRAM NOTES:

"I wouldn't mind turning into a vermilion goldfish" said renowned French artist, Henri Matisse (1869-1954), whose predilection for exploring and using color and composition in unique and vibrant ways fills his paintings with bold imagery often associated with the Fauvist Art movement. The thoughts of the painter Paul Gauguin were known to Matisse: writing about art and color, Gauguin said “How do you see these trees? They are yellow. So, put in yellow; this shadow, rather blue, paint it with pure ultramarine; these red leaves? Put in vermilion”. To his students, Matisse spoke not of red or orange, but vermilion. From around 1912, goldfish, which had been introduced to Europe from East Asia in 17th century became a recurring subject in the work of Matisse. They appear in no less than nine of his paintings, as well as in his drawings and prints. For Matisse, the goldfish came to symbolize a tranquil state of mind and a lost paradise. Visiting Tangier, Matisse had been intrigued to see how people would daydream for hours, gazing into goldfish bowls. In his paintings, the goldfish immediately attract attention due to their color: vermilion. The bright red-orange, so evident and seemingly bursting with its components of red and yellow fused in a dense complicated color, contrasts strongly to surrounding blues and greens, each made brighter by the presence of the other.

GORDON - Vermilion (for tenor trombone and piano)

This is the studio recording of composer Geoffrey Gordon's orchestral work, PUCK - fleeing from the dawn, featured on the new Orchid Classics CD, Mythologies and Mad Songs - which is inspired by the work of Scottish artist, David Scott (1837). The recording was made in Glasgow, 3-4 October 2022, with producer Alex Van Ingen.

***********

In the last scene of A Midsummer Night's Dream, the magical fairy Puck comes into the palace of Theseus after all the mortals have retired for the night. 
He says,

And we fairies, that do run
By the triple Hecate's team,
From the presence of the sun,
Following darkness like a dream,
Now are frolic.

Oberon, Titania and their band of fairies then enter, "Hand in hand, with fairy grace" to "sing, and bless this place." Their work, Oberon says, must be finished by break of day. Scott's work depicts a scene that does not occur until the play is over and all the supernatural creatures have left the palace. It is this imagined scene which inspires the music for this tone poem.

GORDON - PUCK - fleeing from the dawn

This is the live premiere performance of Geoffrey Gordon's la terre est bleue comme une orange No. 2  (the earth is blue like an orange) - a work for string quartet inspired by French surrealist poet Paul Eluard's iconic poem. 

This work was commissioned by the San Francisco-based Friction Quartet and the premieres took place on 23 and 24 September 2022 at Noe Valley Ministry and Ruth Bancroft Garden in San Francisco.

**************
The earth Is blue like an orange

No error the words do not lie
They no longer allow you to sing
In the tower of kisses agreement
The madness the love
She her mouth of alliance
All the secrets all the smiles
Or what dress of indulgence
To believe in quite naked.
The wasps flourish greenly
Dawn goes by round her neck
A necklace of windows
You are all the solar joys
All the sun of this earth
On the roads of your beauty.

- Paul Eluard 
(translated from the French)

GORDON: La terre est bleue comme une orange No. 2 (for one string quartet)

This is an excerpt of the first movement of Geoffrey Gordon's Creavit Deus Hominem, for oboe and orchestra, from the world premiere performance by the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra, conductor Duncan Ward and soloist José Luis García Vegara, for whom the orchestra commissioned the new work, which is inspired by the Synchromism art movement of the early 20th c. 

Performance: Hr-Sendesaal, Frankfurt, Germany...2 June 2023.

GORDON - Creavit Deus Hominem I. Still Life (excerpt)

This is the studio recording of Geoffrey Gordon's Vermilion for tenor trombone and piano, after the painting by Matisse, featuring trombone soloist Håkan Björkman (Principal trombone, Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra and Chamber Orchestra of Europe) and pianist Pilar Beltran. 

Recorded 11 September, Royal College of Music, 
Stockholm, Sweden - Sound engineer: Jan-Olof Gullö, RCM.

PROGRAM NOTE:

"I wouldn't mind turning into a vermilion goldfish" said renowned French artist, Henri Matisse (1869-1954), whose predilection for exploring and using colour and composition in unique and vibrant
ways fills his paintings with bold colours and techniques associated with the Fauvist Art movement. The thoughts of the painter Paul Gauguin were known to Matisse: writing about art and color, Gauguin said “How do you see these trees? They are yellow. So, put in yellow; this shadow, rather blue, paint it with pure ultramarine; these red leaves? Put in vermilion”. To his students, Matisse spoke not of red or orange, but vermilion. From around 1912, goldfish, which had been introduced to Europe from East Asia in 17th century, became a recurring subject in the work of Matisse. They appear in no less than nine of his paintings, as well as in his drawings and prints. For Matisse, the goldfish came to symbolize a tranquil state of mind and a lost paradise. Visiting Tangier, Matisse had been intrigued to see how people would daydream for hours, gazing into goldfish bowls. In his paintings, the goldfish immediately attract attention, due to their colour: vermilion. The bright red-orange, so evident and seemingly bursting with its components of red and yellow fused in a dense complicated colour, contrasts strongly to surrounding blues and greens, each made brighter by the presence of the other.

GORDON - Vermilion  (studio)

This is the studio recording of Geoffrey Gordon's orchestral work, Nescientis Animi, after the math of Gottfried Leibniz, recorded in Glasgow, featuring the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra with conductor Martyn Brabbins from sessions 4 October 2022.

"musica is exercitium arithmeticae occultum nescientis is numerare animi "
-Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz

“Music is the veiled arithmetical practice of the spirit (who knows not, that it is counting).”
- From Gottfried Leibniz’ letter to Christian Goldbach of 17 April 1712, Opera omnia Volume III, Dutens, Geneva, 1768.

Program note:

While the writings of the great German mathematician and philosopher, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646 1716), on music and music theory are few (mainly found in simple allusions within philosophical texts or within correspondence letters), the presiding themes of his discourse on the subject speak with an unquestionable and fascinating resonance of the relationship between harmony and dissonance, arithmetic and music. In his letter written in Latin to Christian Goldbach of 17 April 1712 (Opera omnia Volume III, Dutens, Geneva, 1768), Leibniz famously assimilates music to an unconscious arithmetic and asserts that music is essentially the effect and pleasure which the mind experiences from counting without being aware that it is counting and that music is essentially governed by arithmetic. In the letter to Goldbach, Leibniz considers the relations between the prime numbers, the limitation of our counting to 5, sometimes 7 (heralding a new kind of music) and beyond, the coincidences which produce consonance and the success of random irrational ratios which produce dissonance. The complexity of Leibniz’s analysis seems indefatigable and yet his letter touches on a matter special to music - a truth about music, and thereby an irony, on which Leibniz would not mathematically theorize: the power of music to move the spirit.

“Nescientis animi” draws its title from the Latin text (literally meaning “unconscious mind”) of Leibniz’ letter to Goldbach of 17 April 1712, and is a sonic discovery in orchestral setting of Leibniz’ considerations and analyses of the relationship between harmony and dissonance, arithmetic and music. The work is in one movement for orchestra with a duration of approximately 15 minutes. Within a clear architectural structure, the music unfolds around a series of specific triadic formations which are placed against more free flowing, abstract passages; allusion to number structures based on 1, 3, 5 and then 7 and on higher (though not necessarily as basic triads); intervals of 3rds juxtaposed against 4ths, questioning and experimenting to prioritize 3 as perfect over 4 as imperfect, scrunched by a rich, dark and intense handling of dissonance - compelling bodily the feel and sound of the paradox … the exquisite emotion which dissonance and consonance share.  The music drives inexorably towards the final section where earlier glimpses of melody reveal a literal musical allusion to the well known JH Gallus motet, “Ecce, quomodo moritur iustus” -  a funeral song to which Leibniz refers in one of his letters, expressing his realization that sometimes something quite inexplicable occurs upon hearing music which moves the listener in an extraordinary, sensory and emotional way (quite apart from a mathematical or analytical point of view). The Gallus reference compels us to consider the extraordinary effect of the motet upon Leibniz, in the context of otherwise contemporary musical language – reaching both backward and forward as it dominates in the closing moments of this work.


PRODUCER: Alex Van Ingen

THIS IS A PRIVATE RECORDING AND MAY NOT BE SHARED WITHOUT PERMISSION.

GORDON - Nescientis Animi

This is the world premiere of Geoffrey Gordon's song cycle, At the round earths imagin'd corners, for baritone and piano, after the Holy Sonnets of John Donne, commissioned for and premiered as part of the Oxford International Song Festival, with baritone Julien Van Mellaerts and pianist Alisdair Hogarth - Holywell Music Room, Oxford, England... 7:45pm 27 October 2023.

I. At The Round Earths Imagin'd Corners

This is the premiere performance of Geoffrey Gordon's song cycle, Winterleben, a setting of five texts by poet Friedrich Rückert, for mezzo, horn and piano, commissioned for Los Angeles Philharmonic principal horn, Andrew Bain, through the gracious support of Elizabeth and Justus Schlichting.

Friday, August 7, 2015
Zipper Hall, Los Angeles

Andrew Bain, horn
Renee Rapier, mezzo
Nic Gerpe, piano

PROGRAM NOTE:

Friedrich Rückert, (1788-1866) – German poet, philologist, orientalist – was a profound source of inspiration for Gustav Mahler. The composer identified deeply with the directness and refined sensibility of his verses, declaring that ‘after Des Knaben Wunderhorn I could not compose anything but Rückert – this is lyric poetry from the source, all else is lyric poetry of a derivative kind’. Mahler set many of Rückert’s texts—Rückert-Lieder, Kindertotenlieder—but of course there are many Rückert texts which he did not set, including the five poem collection known as Winterleben (Winter Life). What follows is a new work, for mezzo soprano, French horn soloist (sharing equal prominence throughout the work) and piano, based on these beautiful and evocative Rückert poems.

-Geoffrey Gordon

TEXT:

II.Winter-Lerchenton

In Lüften hängt ein Lerchenton,
 Mein Ohr hat staunend ihn vernommen.
 Ist's eine, die noch nicht entflohn?
 Ist's eine, die zurückgekommen,
 Gelockt von Frühling schon,
 Da rings die Schöpfung noch von Winter ist beklommen?

 Durch meine Seele zieht ein Schwung,
 Den jener Ton hat angeschlagen.
 Ist's Ahnung, ist's Erinnerung
 Von künftigen, von vor'gen Tagen?
 Ich fühle nur mich jung,
 Ob wie ich's war, ob wie ich sein werd'? ist zu fragen.

 Verklungen ist die Melodie,
 Verschlungen von Schneewolkenherden;
 Und Winter ist's im Herzen, wie
 Am Himmel Winter und auf Erden,
 So Winter, als ob nie
 Gewesen Frühling sei und nimmer sollte werden.


GORDON Winterleben II

This is the premiere performance of Geoffrey Gordon's song cycle, Winterleben, a setting of five texts by poet Friedrich Rückert, for mezzo, horn and piano, commissioned for Los Angeles Philharmonic principal horn, Andrew Bain, through the gracious support of Elizabeth and Justus Schlichting.

Friday, August 7, 2015
Zipper Hall, Los Angeles

Andrew Bain, horn
Renee Rapier, mezzo
Nic Gerpe, piano

PROGRAM NOTE:

Friedrich Rückert, (1788-1866) – German poet, philologist, orientalist – was a profound source of inspiration for Gustav Mahler. The composer identified deeply with the directness and refined sensibility of his verses, declaring that ‘after Des Knaben Wunderhorn I could not compose anything but Rückert – this is lyric poetry from the source, all else is lyric poetry of a derivative kind’. Mahler set many of Rückert’s texts—Rückert-Lieder, Kindertotenlieder—but of course there are many Rückert texts which he did not set, including the five poem collection known as Winterleben (Winter Life). What follows is a new work, for mezzo soprano, French horn soloist (sharing equal prominence throughout the work) and piano, based on these beautiful and evocative Rückert poems.

-Geoffrey Gordon

TEXT:

I. Die Winternachtigall

So laut im Winterzimmer schmettert
 Die Nachtigall,
 Daß sich ein Frühlingshain beblättert
 An ihrem Schall:
 Zum blauen Himmel wird die Decke
 Und jede Wand zur grünen Hecke,
 Zur Schattengrotte jede Dunkelecke,
 Des Vorhangs Weh'n zu Bäche-Rieselfall.

 Nur wenn der Himmel oft so schaurig
 Durchs Fenster schaut,
 Dann klagt die Nachtigall so traurig
 Den Klagelaut,
 Als wollte sie ihr Los verklagen,
 Daß sie in Winterhaft muß schlagen
 Und schweigen einst, wann in beglücktern Tagen
 Der freie Frühling seinen Tempel baut.

 Doch laß dich das nur nicht verdrießen
 Und singe zu!
 Ein Lenz muß auch im Winter sprießen,
 Den wirkest du.
 O Himmelskehl' im Zeitenfroste,
 Du bist gegeben uns zum Troste;
 Sing' nur, und ob es dir die Seele koste,
 In jede Seele Sehnsucht, Schmerz und Ruh'.


GORDON Winterleben I

This is the third movement of Geoffrey Gordon's FATHOMS, Five Impressions of Shakespeare's The Tempest (with Prelude) for cello and piano, in a performance by cellist Toke Moldrup and pianist Steven Beck, from Carnegie Hall, 17 December 2015.

"You taught me language, and my profit on't
Is, I know how to curse ..."

FATHOMS III Caliban (and Sycorax)

This is the first movement of Geoffrey Gordon's FATHOMS, Five Impressions of Shakespeare's The Tempest (with Prelude) for cello and piano, in a performance by cellist Toke Moldrup and pianist Steven Beck, from Carnegie Hall, 17 December 2015.

Miranda: "Do you love me?"
Ferdinand: "O heaven! O earth! Bear witness to this sound ...."

FATHOMS I Ferdinand And Miranda

This is the prelude from Geoffrey Gordon's FATHOMS, Five Impressions of Shakespeare's The Tempest (with Prelude) for cello and piano, in a performance by cellist Toke Moldrup and pianist Steven Beck, from Carnegie Hall, 17 December 2015.

"A most auspicious star...."



FATHOMS: Prelude And Storm

This is the world premiere performance of the first movement of Geoffrey Gordon's QUINTET for Clarinet and Strings, played by the JACK Quartet and New York Philharmonic principal clarinet, Anthony McGill.  The New York Times called the work, commissioned by the American Music Project, "darkly seductive....."

"Mr. Gordon’s Clarinet Quintet combines a zest for sonic experimentation with a four-movement structure built around thematic signposts — reiterations of an opening motif — that guide the listener through a colorful and atmospheric journey. That motif is built on accordion-like layered string chords from which the clarinet emerges almost coyly, with a veiled sound and sinewy flutter."

Across four movements, the interaction between clarinet and strings changes, with moments of bright commonality and others in which the warm, musky clarinet tone contrasts with the sharper and glossier one of the string quartet. In the third movement, small cells of players break away for a series of arresting duos and a trio that chart different interpersonal dynamics. The work ends softly on a languid low clarinet trill, which Mr. McGill played so quietly that the final notes were not so much heard as felt as gently pulsating airwaves."

The New York Times: 22 November 2015

QUINTET for Clarinet and Strings: First Movement

This is the studio recording, on the Signum label, of Geoffrey Gordon's double concerto, Saint Blue, commissioned for the English String Orchestra and soloists Simon Desbruslais and Clare Hammond, through funds provided by Arts Council England. Inspired by the works of Russian visual artist and visionary, Wassily Kandinsky, Saint Blue (scored for trumpet, piano and strings) is divided into two contrasting sections, with the second essentially embedded in the first—a kind of sonic exploration of the sacred and profane—in a fairly straight-forward A-B-A design. The first section is a reaction to Kandinsky’s 1911 All Saints I (part of the Stadtische Galerie’s permanent collection in Munich), and features the soloists and full string orchestra in a shared expression of this colorful masterpiece. The contrasting B section draws the orchestra’s principal double bass into a trio with the trumpet and piano soloists, creating a kind of extended, jazz-infused cadenza, after Kandinsky’s In Blue (1925; part of the Kunstsammlung Museum’s collection in Dusseldorf). An animated return to the tutti string orchestra and some (evolved) thematic music from All Saints I, concludes Saint Blue. 

"Geoffrey Gordon’s Saint Blue, inspired by two Kandinsky paintings ('All Saints 1' and 'In Blue', well worth a web search), is by far the best work on this engaging disc; a taut and exhilarating single movement concerto, wonderfully played by soloists Simon Desbruslais and Clare Hammond."

–Chris Achenbach
Classical Ear (UK): 30 April 2018

"Geoffrey Gordon's Saint Blue is inspired by two Kandinsky paintings, All Saints I and In Blue and constructed as 'a sonic exploration of the sacred and profane,' with the trumpet deployed first as an instrument of heavenly summons, then as the bluesy soul of jazz in this complex, richly-satisfying work."

-Kate Wakeling
BBC Music Magazine: January 2018

Saint Blue (double concerto for trumpet, piano and strings after Kandinsky)

This is the world premiere performance of the fourth movement of Geoffrey Gordon's QUINTET for Clarinet and Strings, played by the JACK Quartet and New York Philharmonic principal clarinet, Anthony McGill.  The New York Times called the work, commissioned by the American Music Project, "darkly seductive....."

"Mr. Gordon’s Clarinet Quintet combines a zest for sonic experimentation with a four-movement structure built around thematic signposts — reiterations of an opening motif — that guide the listener through a colorful and atmospheric journey. That motif is built on accordion-like layered string chords from which the clarinet emerges almost coyly, with a veiled sound and sinewy flutter."

Across four movements, the interaction between clarinet and strings changes, with moments of bright commonality and others in which the warm, musky clarinet tone contrasts with the sharper and glossier one of the string quartet. In the third movement, small cells of players break away for a series of arresting duos and a trio that chart different interpersonal dynamics. The work ends softly on a languid low clarinet trill, which Mr. McGill played so quietly that the final notes were not so much heard as felt as gently pulsating airwaves."

The New York Times: 22 November 2015

QUINTET for Clarinet and Strings: Fourth Movement

This is the world premiere performance of the second movement of Geoffrey Gordon's QUINTET for Clarinet and Strings, played by the JACK Quartet and New York Philharmonic principal clarinet, Anthony McGill.  The New York Times called the work, commissioned by the American Music Project, "darkly seductive....."

"Mr. Gordon’s Clarinet Quintet combines a zest for sonic experimentation with a four-movement structure built around thematic signposts — reiterations of an opening motif — that guide the listener through a colorful and atmospheric journey. That motif is built on accordion-like layered string chords from which the clarinet emerges almost coyly, with a veiled sound and sinewy flutter."

Across four movements, the interaction between clarinet and strings changes, with moments of bright commonality and others in which the warm, musky clarinet tone contrasts with the sharper and glossier one of the string quartet. In the third movement, small cells of players break away for a series of arresting duos and a trio that chart different interpersonal dynamics. The work ends softly on a languid low clarinet trill, which Mr. McGill played so quietly that the final notes were not so much heard as felt as gently pulsating airwaves."

The New York Times: 22 November 2015

QUINTET for Clarinet and Strings: Second Movement

This is the world premiere performance of the third movement of Geoffrey Gordon's QUINTET for Clarinet and Strings, played by the JACK Quartet and New York Philharmonic principal clarinet, Anthony McGill.  The New York Times called the work, commissioned by the American Music Project, "darkly seductive....."

"Mr. Gordon’s Clarinet Quintet combines a zest for sonic experimentation with a four-movement structure built around thematic signposts — reiterations of an opening motif — that guide the listener through a colorful and atmospheric journey. That motif is built on accordion-like layered string chords from which the clarinet emerges almost coyly, with a veiled sound and sinewy flutter."

Across four movements, the interaction between clarinet and strings changes, with moments of bright commonality and others in which the warm, musky clarinet tone contrasts with the sharper and glossier one of the string quartet. In the third movement, small cells of players break away for a series of arresting duos and a trio that chart different interpersonal dynamics. The work ends softly on a languid low clarinet trill, which Mr. McGill played so quietly that the final notes were not so much heard as felt as gently pulsating airwaves."

The New York Times: 22 November 2015

QUINTET for Clarinet and Strings: Third Movement

This is the first movement of Geoffrey Gordon's Three Summer Sketches, for solo piano, commissioned for pianist Jeri-Mae Astolfi by the Wisconsin Arts Board, and recorded on the Ravello label.  Buy the whole disc here: http://www.ravellorecords.com/wisconsinsoundscapes/

Three Summer Sketches: I. Black Earth

This is the sixth song from Geoffrey Gordon's song cycle, Sonnets from Neruda, setting six sonnets from Cien sonetos de amor (100 Love Sonnets) for mezzo soprano, baritone and piano, in a performance at the Arnold Schönberg Center in Vienna, featuring mezzo soprano Natalia Kawalek, baritone Tobias Greenhalgh and pianist Marcin Koziel, 16 March 2018.

Soneto 81

Ya eres mía. Reposa con tu sueño en mi sueño.
Amor, dolor, trabajos, deben dormir ahora.
Gira la noche sobre sus invisibles ruedas
y junto a mí eres pura como el ámbar dormido.
Ninguna más, amor, dormirá con mis sueños.
Irás, iremos juntos por las aguas del tiempo.
Ninguna viajará por la sombra conmigo,
sólo tú, siempreviva, siempre sol, siempre luna.
Ya tus manos abrieron los puños delicados
y dejaron caer suaves signos sin rumbo,
tus ojos se cerraron como dos alas grises,
mientras yo sigo el agua que llevas y me lleva:
la noche, el mundo, el viento devanan su destino,
y ya no soy sin ti sino sólo tu sueño.

And now you’re mine. Rest with your dream in my dream.
Love and pain and work must sleep now.
The night turns on its invisible wheels,
and beside me you are pure as sleeping amber.
No one else, Love, will sleep in my dreams.
You will go, we will go together, through the waters of time.
No one else will travel through the shadows with me,
only you, evergreen, ever sun, ever moon.
Your hands have already opened their delicate fists
and let their soft drifting signs fall away,
your eyes have closed like two gray wings,
while I follow the water that you carry and that carries me away:
the night, the world, the wind spin out their destiny,
and already without you I am only your dream.

*************

Sonnets From Neruda VI. Ya eres mía

This is the fifth song from Geoffrey Gordon's song cycle, Sonnets from Neruda, setting six sonnets from Cien sonetos de amor (100 Love Sonnets) for mezzo soprano, baritone and piano, in a performance at the Arnold Schönberg Center in Vienna, featuring baritone Tobias Greenhalgh and pianist Marcin Koziel, 16 March 2018.

Soneto 79

De noche, amada, amarra tu corazón al mío
y que ellos en el sueño derroten las tinieblas
como un doble tambor combatiendo en el bosque
contra el espeso muro de las hojas mojadas.
Nocturna travesía, brasa negra del sueño
interceptando el hilo de las uvas terrestres
con la puntualidad de un tren descabellado
que sombra y piedras frías sin cesar arrastrara.
Por eso, amor, amárrame el movimiento puro,
a la tenacidad que en tu pecho golpea
con las alas de un cisne sumergido,
para que a las preguntas estrelladas del cielo
responda nuestro sueño con una sola llave,
con una sola puerta cerrada por la sombra.

Tie your heart at night to mine, love,
and both will defeat the darkness
like twin drums beating in the forest
against the heavy wall of wet leaves.
Night crossing, black coal of dream
that cuts the thread of earthly orbs
with the punctuality of a headlong train
that pulls cold stone and shadow endlessly.
Love, because of it, tie me to a purer movement,
to the grip on life that beats in your breast,
with the wings of a submerged swan,
So that our dream might reply
to the sky's questioning stars
with one key, one door closed to shadow.

Sonnets From Neruda V. De noche, amada, amarra tu corazón al mío

This is the first song from Geoffrey Gordon's song cycle, Sonnets from Neruda, setting six sonnets from Cien sonetos de amor (100 Love Sonnets) for mezzo soprano, baritone and piano, in a performance at the Arnold Schönberg Center in Vienna, featuring mezzo soprano Natalia Kawalek and pianist Marcin Koziel, 16 March 2018.

Soneto 2

Amor, cuántos caminos hasta llegar a un beso,
qué soledad errante hasta tu compañía!
Siguen los trenes solos rodando con la lluvia.
En Taltal no amanece aún la primavera.
Pero tú y yo, amor mío, estamos juntos,
juntos desde la ropa a las raíces,
juntos de otoño, de agua, de caderas,
hasta ser sólo tú, sólo yo juntos.
Pensar que costó tantas piedras que lleva el río,
la desembocadura del agua de Boroa,
pensar que separados por trenes y naciones
tú y yo teníamos que simplemente amarnos,
con todos confundidos, con hombres y mujeres,
con la tierra que implanta y educa los claveles.

Love, how many roads to reach a kiss
what wandering loneliness until your company!
Follow the train tracks alone running with the rain.
In Taltal there is neither daybreak nor spring.
But you and I, my love, we are together,
together from our clothes down to our roots
together in the autumn, in water, in hips,
until it becomes only you, only me together.
To think that it took many stones carried by the river,
the river mouth of Boroa
To think that trains and nations separate us
You and I had only to love one another:
with all the confusions, with men and women,
with the land that sows and makes bloom the carnations.

Sonnets From Neruda I. Amor, cuántos caminos hasta llegar a un beso

This is the world premiere of Geoffrey Gordon's new chamber work, Cosmic Inflation and the End of the Dark Ages - commissioned by the Institut Curie, as part of the Muse-IC project - from the performance in Paris, at the Salle Cortot concert hall, on 12 March 2019, featuring an ensemble drawn from the musicians of the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, conducted by Marc Desmons.  Cosmic Inflation and the End of the Dark Ages, scored for bass clarinet(doubling Bb clarinet), string quartet, piano and harp, is inspired by the research of astrophysicist Herve Dole into the first vibrations of the universe.

VIDEO OF CONCERT PERFORMANCE:
https://youtu.be/psbVGXidTrg?t=2547

GORDON - Cosmic Inflation and the End of the Dark Ages

This is an excerpt from the first movement of the premiere performance of composer Geoffrey Gordon's bass clarinet concerto, Prometheus, featuring the Philharmonia Orchestra, from Royal Festival Hall, Southbank Centre, London, with soloist Laurent Ben Slimane and guest conductor, Martyn Brabbins, 19 January 2019.

PROGRAM NOTE:

Prometheus is inspired by the short story by Franz Kafka, based on the Greek legend. That text is as follows:

There are four legends concerning Prometheus:

I. According to the first, he was clamped to a rock in the Caucasus for betraying the secrets of the gods to men, and the gods sent eagles to feed on his liver, which was perpetually renewed.

II. According to the second, Prometheus, goaded by the pain of the tearing beaks, pressed himself deeper and deeper into the rock until he became one with it.

III. According to the third, his treachery was forgotten in the course of thousands of years, the gods forgotten, the eagles, he himself forgotten.

IV. According to the fourth, every one grew weary of the meaningless affair. The gods grew weary, the eagles grew weary, the wound closed wearily.

There remained the inexplicable mass of rock.--The legend tried to explain the inexplicable. As it came out of a substratum of truth it had in turn to end in the inexplicable.

Franz Kafka (1917) public domain

GORDON - Prometheus 1st Movement

This is the premiere (live) recording of Geoffrey Gordon's Bagatelle after Beethoven, a solo piano work commissioned for the International Beethoven Project’s Beethoven Festival: REVOLUTION 2012 and performed by pianist James Giles, 16 September 2012, at the National Pastime Theater, Chicago.

GORDON - Bagatelle after Beethoven

This is the world premiere performance of Geoffrey Gordon's Concerto for Flute and Orchestra, commissioned for soloist Carol Wincenc and the Buffalo Philharmonic, from April 5, 2013,  Kleinhans Music Hall, Buffalo, New York. Making his US debut, Christoph-Mathias Mueller is the guest conductor.

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     Geoffrey Gordon has produced a rich catalog of new music in diverse genres including chamber and orchestral, works for voice and solo instruments, and various scores for theater, dance and film. As a winner of the Aaron Copland Award, he twice served as  composer-in-residence at the Aaron Copland House. His music has been sponsored by the Barlow Endowment, the National Endowment for the Arts, the United Performing Arts Fund, the Concert Artists Guild, and the American Composers Forum, among many others.

     The Flute Concerto is dedicated to Carol Wincenc and the BPO, commissioned by the Orchestra and an anonymous donor. This world premiere represents a creative homecoming, in that both Ms. Wincenc and Mr. Gordon are former residents of Western New York.

     The new Concerto reveals a composer who has found a singular voice in the very large milieu of serious contemporary music. Today's manners and modes are very different from those which comprised the so-called avant-garde in the middle and later 20th century. The former was a time when 'anything goes' provided a chic calling card for composers who believed that in order to be 'new' they had to disavow as much 'past' as possible. But the idea of 'freedom of expression' for its own sake is now passe. In the last decade or two, many composers have embraced the idea that fine music should be 'about something' - as Tchaikovsky had the courage to say.

     Indeed, with Gordon's new setting for flute and orchestra, we have an up-to-date tone-tableau which conjures a snapshot of a much-beloved scene in Shakespeare's Midsummer Night's Dream, i.e. in Act II when Oberon describes how Cupid delivers his charm. From the scene, Gordon attached two lines to the title page of the score:

    And certain stars shot madly from their spheres
           To hear the sea-maid's music.

     In full context:
Since once I sat upon a promontory,
And heard a mermaid on a dolphin's back
Uttering such dulcet and harmonious breath
That the rude sea grew civil at her song,
And certain stars shot madly from their spheres
To hear the sea-maid's music.

That very time I saw, but thou couldst not,
Flying between the cold moon and the earth
Cupid, all arm'd; a certain aim he took
At a fair vestal, throned by the west,
And loos'd his love-shaft smartly from his bow,
As it should pierce a hundred thousand hearts;

      Gordon develops the motif in the solo line by providing a continuous narrative of tuneful fragments, all woven together in a long garland of evocative effects. To support the lyrical journey in the flute, the score calls for a large orchestra, with piano and celeste, and two very rich sections of percussion including: triangles, bell tree, mark tree, woodblocks, glockenspiel, marimba, tubular bells, bass drum, various cymbals, gongs, tam-tams and tom-toms, crotales, vibraphone, xylophone, and bongos.

     The work is scored in one movement with a tantalizing cadenza for the soloist. In order to blend the many musical episodes into a continuous musical chain, the composer employs many changes in tempo and meter. Rather than functioning as an accompanying escort, the orchestra serves to embellish the flow of the musical imagery conjured by the sea-maiden solo flute.

     Flutist Carol Wincenc takes on the role quite naturally, writing: "In Astrological terms, I am a born Cancerian - or moon child. As a lover of the water and an avid swimmer, a sea maiden is what I am. And as for the stars shooting madly, that is a very powerful image - luminescence and the forward force."

- Edward Yadzinski
Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra
Program Notes

Concerto for Flute and Orchestra

US/UK composer Geoffrey Gordon’s contributions to the contemporary music repertoire have been and continue to be exceptional.  Intense and luxuriant harmony, passionate melody and superb handling of instrumentation and sonic textures define his music.  His works include orchestral, chamber and vocal works, recognised and performed by the world's top musicians and ensembles.  His music has been called "darkly seductive" (The New York Times), "complex, richly-satisfying " (BBC Music Magazine), “stunning” (Philadelphia Inquirer), “iridescent and glowing” (Chicago Tribune), “taut and exhilarating” (Classical Ear), “haunting” (Strings Magazine), "gripping" (Bachtrack), "fierce and uncompromising" (MusicWeb International) and “magnificent” (Fanfare).  The Philharmonia identifies “his infectious style" and “an ear for melody”; the New York Times his “zest for sonic experimentation”.  

Recently and upcoming, the BBC Philharmonic will premiere Mr. Gordon's new bassoon concerto, Anima Mia, during the 2022-23 concert season; the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, Swedish Chamber Orchestra and Hong Kong Sinfonietta will premiere a jointly commissioned chamber concerto for Bb clarinet and ensemble, Fumee; and the Antwerp Symphony will premiere Mr. Gordon's Mad Song, which they commissioned for soloist Dimitri Mestdag. 

In 2018, the Philharmonia gave the premiere of Geoffrey’s Gordon’s bass clarinet concerto “Prometheus” after the treatment by Franz Kafka, at the RFH, with US and Nordic premieres following in 2019 with the Minnesota Orchestra and Malmo Symphony.   His superb setting of Keats' “Ode to a Nightingale” for choir and cello premiered in May 2018 in Copenhagen by Mogens Dahl Chamber Choir and a new CD of three of his major cello works, Cello Libris,  was released on the BIS label in early 2020, featuring the Copenhagen Philharmonic under Lan Shui.  His song cycles, “Peter Quince at the Clavier” and “Sonnets from Neruda” premiered in March 2018 at the Arnold Schoenberg Center, Vienna, and in October 2017 the Munich Philharmonic under James Gaffigan premiered his trumpet concerto, "CHASE," after the sculptures of Giacometti.  His cello sonata “FATHOMS” premiered at Carnegie Hall in  December 2015  and his “Winterleben” for horn, mezzo and piano (commissioned for Los Angeles Philharmonic principal horn, Andrew Bain), premiered in August 2015 as part of the 47th International Horn Symposium in Los Angeles.  Honoured by a number of residencies internationally, he has twice served as composer-in-residence at the Aaron Copland House and is winner of 2017 Mario Merz Prize for Music Composition. In 2018, he was commissioned by the Curie Institute in Paris, part of the Muse-IC project. A new chamber work, featuring musicians from the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, premiered at the  Salle Cortot Theatre in Paris in March, 2019. 

Future performances and commissions include new works for the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, the National Taiwan Symphony Orchestra, the Brussels Philharmonic and many others.

Find more links to Geoffrey Gordon's music, as well as bio and reviews etc. at www.geoffreygordoncomposer.com

NEW CD, Cello Libris, out on BIS Records!  
Find it here:
https://bis.se/performers/moldrup-toke/cello-libris-works-by-geoffrey-gordon

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