A compilation of new works commissioned and premiered by Soundstreams in 2013. 

World Premieres 2013

The Death Of Shalana Excerpt by R. Murray Schafer

The life-affirming poet Walt Whitman is a favourite source of texts for James Rolfe. He says that, “I respond very keenly to Whitman’s personal vision, a fusion of the spiritual and the physical, and his strongly rhythmic language, written with the cadences of the King James Bible in his ear.”

This work was premiered on October 1, 2013 at 'The Music of Arvo Pärt' concert at Koerner Hall in Toronto (Canada) and performed by Shannon Mercer (soprano), Geoffrey Sirett (baritone), Choir 21, Virtuoso String Orchestra and Tonu Kaljuste (conductor).

For more information about James Rolfe and his work, please visit our SoundMakers website: www.SoundMakers.ca/composers/james-rolfe

About the Composer

Open Road by James Rolfe

 Ristic acknowledges the influence of both popular and folk music in his classical compositions. His new work, 'Boiling Song', commissioned by Soundstreams with the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and receiving its premiere on this concert, uses pop and folk material as building blocks but also introduces “...clear reference to liquid heating, bubbles appearing, and the whole thing turning into vapour at the end.” 

This work was premiered on November 13, 2013 at the Jeanne Leamon Hall in Toronto, Canada, performed by Chamber Orchestra and conducted by Joaquín Valdepeñas.

Learn more about André Ristic and Soundstreams commission catalogue at: www.SoundMakers.ca/composer/andre-ristic

Boiling Song by André Ristic

"Distance is scored for mixed ensemble including four Chinese traditional instruments and Western instruments. The reason why I titled this piece Distance is that I have been questioning myself for a long time. Distance does not only mean time and space, but also signifies the ability to reconsider and rediscover the “roots” of language and culture. Meanwhile, distance could imply the echo, dialogue, contrast, transplantation and integration of form and content as well. This piece is a new starting point for me to explore, understand and clarify the meaning of distance through my music composition."
Fuhong Shi, 2013

This work was premiered on May 14, 2013 at the 'Music for China' concert presented by Soundstreams and performed by: Accordes String Quartet, Chai Found Music Workshop, Sanya Eng (harp), Leslie Newman (flute), Gregory Oh (piano), Ryan Scott (percussion), Anthony Thompson (clarinet), Les Dala (conductor).

For more information about Fuhong Shi and the Soundstreams commission catalogue, please visit our SoundMakers website: http://www.SoundMakers.ca/composers/fuhong-shi

Distance by Fuhong Shi

1. anticipation
2. where lost memories gather 
3. garden of soft shadows
4. love thyself
5. of ever lingering light

"As a second-generation Chinese American (now also Canadian), the issue of cultural self-identity has always been somewhat perplexing. In previous works for mixed Chinese and Western chamber ensemble I used my music as a medium to address this issue head on. In contrast, my most recent work, entitled Small and Curious Places, puts aside the question of East vs. West and instead approaches the ensemble as a group of individual instruments and their unique characteristics, with none more distinct or exotic than the others. There is no grand, overarching statement in this work; contrarily, the movements are independent of one another, and mostly quite introspective. Each movement is a self-contained miniature, an exploration of a particular sound space.

The imaginary and peculiar places of this collection are inspired by various imagery, captured moments or states of mind. In the first movement, “anticipation,” continuously surging momentum provides a framework for the expansion of a single line into increasingly rich, dense and unexpected harmonic sonorities. The second movement, “where lost memories gather” introduces a texture of glassy, static string clusters from which isolated musical gestures emerge and submerge again. “Garden of soft shadows” has a limited timbral palette and is characterized by soft whispering and scuttling sounds that evoke a sense of quiet unease. The following movement, “love thyself,” is built up of very short musical bits and fragments that pile up until pent-up energy at last erupts. The last movement is a meditation on the tenuous moment just as waking becomes slumber. “Of ever lingering light” is the imaginary place where one might capture this fleeting moment and prolong it, hovering indefinitely within this elusive space. Small and Curious Places was commissioned by Soundstreams."
Dorothy Chang (2013)

Learn more about Dorothy Chang's work and the Soundstreams commission catalogue on our SoundMakers website: SoundMakers.ca/composers/dorothy-chang

Small and Curious Places by Dorothy Chang

Carrousel is a quartet for keyboards: Glockenspiel, Vibraphone, Marimba, and Piano. I think of this instrumentation as a way of “preparing” the piano part - not with bolts and rubber bits, but with three mallet instruments with different colours, ranges and sounds, surrounding the piano. My intention is that each keyboard create iterations of the piano’s momentum with reflective sparks that bounce from one instrument to the other to create something like the blur of double vision. The piece has open-ended references to spiral motion in time, nature, and sound. It suggests that, as we pivot around the sun, all bodies acquire a natural rhythm or pulse, tuned to the return of sunshine and darkness, captives of a solar carousel. Carrousel was commissioned by Soundstreams with financial assistance from the Canada Council for the Arts.

This work was premiered at the 'Fujii Percussion and Voices' presented by Soundstreams on March 5, 2013 at Koerner Hall in Toronto, Canada and performed by: Haruka Fujii (marimba), Rika Fujii (Glockenspiel), Ryan Scott (vibraphone), Gregory Oh (piano).

Learn more about Michael Oesterle on our SoundMakers website: SoundMakers.ca/composers/michael-oesterle

Carrousel by Michael Oesterle

"When I spoke with the writer André Alexis about how to approach the subject of Jerusalem, he suggested we begin with the idea of the bridge—the bridge as metaphor for connection (Jerusalem itself being a place where many cultures meet), the bridge as erotic symbol, as symbol of desire and longing. He wrote verses for five actual bridges: Pont-Neuf in Paris; the Stone Arch in Shaharah, Yemen; Arkadiko in Mycenaea; Si-o-se Pol in Isfahan, Iran; and the Alexandra Bridge (a favourite from our Ottawa childhoods). They form a journey toward the final one in Jerusalem: imaginary, unfinished, a bridge to connect this world to our best imaginings of this world."
James Rolfe, 2012

Words by André Alexis
For Soprano, setar, oud, viola de gamba, percussion, organ and SATB quartet.

Performed by Françoise Atlan (soprano), Kiya Tabassian, (setar), Pierre-Yves Martel (viola de gamba), Yair Dalal (oud/violin) Ben Grossman, (percussion), Paul Jenkins (portative organ), SATB quartet and David Fallis (conductor).

Five and a Half Bridges by James Rolfe

“One evening while I was teaching a music education course at Strassbourg University in France, a group of us attended a party given by one of the faculty members. Since my French was not fluent, I drifted off into another room and discovered an old gramophone that seemed to be speaking texts that were repeated over and over.  As I watched the turntable spinning, I saw and heard "the sounds go round." One moment one voice woule seem to be louder, then a different voice would take over while the others drifted away. As I continued to listen to the regurgitations of the machine, this sound-poem came to me. This setting for three choirs commissioned by Soundstreams Canada is an abbreviated version of the full spoken text - a poem which has accompanied me worldwide to conferences and workshops and which captures the elusive playfulness of our ever-changing soundscapes. Je n'ai jamais vu un son, but I have "heard the sounds go round."
R. Murray Schafer (2013)

Explore the R. Murray Schafer compositions commissioned by Soundstreams on our SoundMakers website: SoundMakers.ca/composers/r-murray-schafer

'Hear The Sounds Go Round' by R. Murray Schafer (World Premiere)

In William Shakespeare’s blood-soaked revenge tragedy 'Titus Andronicus', we get to know very little about Lavinia, Titus’s only daughter, even though it is on her that the plot turns. Because of an atrocious crime committed against her, she spends most of her time on stage unable to speak, leaving much of her character and her inner world to be imagined by the audience. Daniel’s oratorio is an exploration of that unknown Lavinia.

The solo vocal groups, consisting of soprano and four male singers (countertenor, two tenors, and baritone), collectively speak with Lavinia’s internal “voice” while the chorus provides external commentary and acts as the voices of those around her. These exchanges between soloists and chorus, combined with an unconventional ensemble accompaniment, create a unique sound world that invites the listener to imagine a new dimension to the tragic figure at the centre of one of Shakespeare’s most harrowing plays.

Libretto by Anne Michaels.

Instrumentation:
for countertenor, 2 tenors, baritone, soprano, mixed chorus, chamber orchestra (oboe, clarinet, bass clarinet, bassoon, C trumpet, trombone, electric guitar, electric bass, 2 percussion)

For more information about Omar Daniel and his work, please visit our SoundMakers website: www.SoundMakers.ca/composers/omar-daniel


The Passion of Lavinia Andronicus by Omar Daniel Sample 41

In William Shakespeare’s blood-soaked revenge tragedy 'Titus Andronicus', we get to know very little about Lavinia, Titus’s only daughter, even though it is on her that the plot turns. Because of an atrocious crime committed against her, she spends most of her time on stage unable to speak, leaving much of her character and her inner world to be imagined by the audience. Daniel’s oratorio is an exploration of that unknown Lavinia.

The solo vocal groups, consisting of soprano and four male singers (countertenor, two tenors, and baritone), collectively speak with Lavinia’s internal “voice” while the chorus provides external commentary and acts as the voices of those around her. These exchanges between soloists and chorus, combined with an unconventional ensemble accompaniment, create a unique sound world that invites the listener to imagine a new dimension to the tragic figure at the centre of one of Shakespeare’s most harrowing plays.

Libretto by Anne Michaels.

Instrumentation:
for countertenor, 2 tenors, baritone, soprano, mixed chorus, chamber orchestra (oboe, clarinet, bass clarinet, bassoon, C trumpet, trombone, electric guitar, electric bass, 2 percussion)

For more information about Omar Daniel and his work, please visit our SoundMakers website: www.SoundMakers.ca/composers/omar-daniel


The Passion of Lavinia Andronicus by Omar Daniel (Sample 40)

The Passion of Lavinia Andronicus by Omar Daniel (Sample 39)

The Passion of Lavinia Andronicus by Omar Daniel Sample 38

The Passion of Lavinia Andronicus by Omar Daniel Sample 37

The Passion of Lavinia Andronicus by Omar Daniel Sample 36

The Passion of Lavinia Andronicus by Omar Daniel (Sample 35)

The Passion of Lavinia Andronicus by Omar Daniel Sample 34

The Passion of Lavinia Andronicus by Omar Daniel (Sample 33)

The Passion of Lavinia Andronicus by Omar Daniel Sample 32

The Passion of Lavinia Andronicus by Omar Daniel Sample 31

The Passion of Lavinia Andronicus by Omar Daniel (Sample 30)

The Passion of Lavinia Andronicus by Omar Daniel (Sample 29)

The Passion of Lavinia Andronicus by Omar Daniel (Sample 28)

The Passion of Lavinia Andronicus by Omar Daniel (Sample 04)

The Passion of Lavinia Andronicus by Omar Daniel (Sample 03)

The Passion of Lavinia Andronicus by Omar Daniel (Sample 02)

The Passion of Lavinia Andronicus by Omar Daniel (Sample 01)

The first commissioned work from Soundstreams inaugural Soundmakers Composer in Online Residence.

Mediaeval Dance by John Kameel Farah

http://soundmakers.ca/Composer-In-Residence/Blog

Multi - Chan 2

Clar Patch 2

For 2 SATB (Soprano, Alto, Tenor, Bass) choirs, 4 percussion. 

Exploring mystical and religious themes of life, death, oblivion, and afterlife, 'Corpus' combines settings of two texts separated by some eight hundred years: the poem 'Corpse', by British writer Michael Symmons Roberts, which appears partly in the piece’s introduction and partly toward its end, and the Dies Irae hymn, which is divided between the two choirs in various ways—sometimes contrapuntally, sometimes antiphonally or homophonically—throughout the composition. Brief biblical excerpts are also used. Percussion plays an important role, with particular emphasis on the use of skins and metals. The two main settings conclude together, to be followed by a brief and musically very different postlude, its Hebrew text taken from Ecclesiastes 1:7 and its references to Middle Eastern folk music offset by soft, undulating choral textures. The effect is of a transition to a new musical and spiritual place, represented by the image of the all-embracing sea.

This work was premiered on March 11, 2012 at the 'Stuttgart Chamber Choir' concert presented by Soundstreams at The Carlu concert venue in Toronto (Canada) and performed by Stuttgart Kammerchor, TorQ Percussion and Frieder Bernius (conductor).

For more information about Paul Frehner and his work, visit our SoundMakers website: http://www.soundmakers.ca/composers/paul-frehner

Corpus by Paul Frehner

In this series of seven musical meditations on the words spoken by Jesus on the cross, Frehner makes dramatic use of counterpoint and other forms of superimposition to explore the meanings and universal resonances of the texts. Whispered fragments of Psalm 22 surround the opening section of the first movement, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” In “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” the passing of time is suggested by the recitation of additional fragments of Psalm 22 and by extended periods of silence. And in the penultimate movement, “It is finished,” Christ’s words are overlaid upon a rhythmically displaced modal setting of Hans Leo Hassler’s O Sacred Head, Now Wounded. The work ends with the soloist singing on a pitch outside of the mode, thus reserving a sense of harmonic resolution as the wait for Easter morning begins.

Cantata for high voice, choir, and string orchestra.

This work was premiered on March 16, 2008 at 'The Last Seven Words' concert presented by Soundstreams at St Anne's Anglican Church in Toronto (Canada)

For more information about Paul Frehner and his work, visit our SoundMakers website: http://www.SoundMakers.ca/composers/paul-frehner

Seven Last Words of Christ by Paul Frehner

On May 19, 1845, two ships, the Terror and the Erebus, set sail under the command of Admiral John Franklin. Their mission: to find the elusive Northwest Passage. They never returned. After three winters, two of them spent stuck in the Arctic ice, the crew at last abandoned their vessels and began an impossible trek southwards, which none survived. The story of that ill-fated expedition had long fascinated Kucharzyk, and when he discovered in the archives of the CBC a transcript and tape of Gwendolyn MacEwen’s 1975 radio play on the subject, he seized the opportunity to give musical voice to the tragic tale. MacEwen’s play was scripted as a series of monologues by four characters: Franklin himself; his second-in-command, Captain Francis Crozier; Qaqortingneq, an Inuk; and Knud Rasmussen, the Danish polar explorer of the early twentieth century, who narrates. In Kucharzyk’s setting, one performer portrays all four characters.

Libretto by Gwendolyn MacEwen  

Instrumentation:
for Solo Baritone and chamber ensemble (flute, 2 clarinet/bass clarinet, trumpet, percussion, 
harp, piano/synth, violin I, violin II, viola, cello, contrabass).

Performed by: Theodore Baerg (baritone), Northern Portraits Ensemble and Gary Kulesha (conductor).

To learn more about Henry Kucharzyk and his work, please visit our SoundMakers website: http://www.SoundMakers.ca/composers/henry-kucharzyk

Terror and Erebus by Henry Kucharzyk

Composed to celebrate what would have been the hundredth birthday of avant-garde pioneer John Cage, this work pays homage to the ideas and philosophies embodied in his music and his words. Cage was famed for integrating non-traditional instruments into his work and for coaxing unconventional sounds from traditional ones; accordingly, Lizée—herself noted for incorporating turntables and other electronic devices into the concert-music setting—here makes extensive use of various objets trouvés (including typewriters and vinyl records on portable turntables struck with mallets) as percussion instruments, regardless of their original purpose.

 The idea of “preparing” instruments, one of Cage’s most significant contributions to modern music, is reflected here in alterations made to the surfaces of vinyl records, generating new patterns and melodies by creating new paths for the stylus. Lizée has described this piece as a kind of dance party for Cage: “a re-imagining of a rave.”

This work was premiered on March 2, 2012 at the 'So Percussion' concert presented at Koerner Hall in Toronto (Canada).

For more information about Nicole Lizée and her work, please visit our SoundMakers website: http://www.SoundMakers.ca/composers/nicole-lizee


White Label Experiment by Nicole Lizée

Using text from Salman Rushdie’s novel 'The Ground Beneath Her Feet' and from abbreviated versions of the Latin Mass, Keys to the Unseen examines the subject of music itself. Two of its parts, Kyrie and Sanctus, refer to music from the past that survives in our consciousness and continues to exert an influence on the way we hear things today. If We Were Worthy of the World is about the transcendent power of singing and its uneasy connection with what used to be called the sacred. 

Instrumentation:
For children’s chorus, mixed chorus, strings, organ, vibraphone.

This work was premiered on February 6, 2000 during the '4 Choirs in Concert' presented by Soundstreams at St. Patrick's Church in Toronto, Canada

For more information about Randolph Peters and his work, please visit our SoundMakers website: http://www.soundmakers.ca/composers/randolph-peters



Keys to the Unseen by Randolph Peters

With computer graphic images by Theo Goldberg  

The lyrical and sensual imagery of the Old Testament’s Song of Solomon is portrayed in four movements: “Morning,” “Afternoon,” “Evening,” and “Night and Daybreak.” The soundscape is derived from vocal recordings of the text and from other recorded sources: a monk singing with the monastery bells at Santissima Annunziata, near Amelia, Italy, together with cicadas and crickets recorded there by the composer; the dawn chorus in Brittany; a stream and a crackling fire. All these sounds are digitally stretched and harmonized, bringing out their inner voices and colours. The result is a Mediterranean soundscape in which all voices are singing, and the boundaries between the self and the environment are blurred. The voice becomes the environment and the environment sings with its own voice, its refrain of “I am my Beloved’s and my Beloved is mine” accompanied by the Hebrew cantillation melody traditionally associated with the text.

Instrumentation:
for oboe d’amore/english horn, two digital soundtracks, and computer graphic images

Performed by: Lawrence Cherney (oboe).

To learn more about this composer and his work, please visit our SoundMakers website: http://www.SoundMakers.ca/composers/barry-truax

Song of Songs by Barry Truax

Composer, improviser, producer of electronic music and visual artist, John Kameel Farah is the first Composer in Residence for Soundstreams' new project: SoundMakers. As part of his residence, he will be creating a new work for piano and electronics over the next few months.

For more information about SoundMakers, please visit our website at: http://www.SoundMakers.ca (site to be published soon).

The Cataclysm by John Kameel Farah

Soundstreams is a Toronto-based music presenter that commissions, develops and showcases the work of contemporary Canadian composers and their international counterparts. 

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