Orchestra

Recording from the 2015 Symphony Australia's Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra Composers' School.

Excerpt displayed with kind permission from the TSO.

PROGRAM  NOTE:

arcane |ärˈkān|
adjective
understood by few; mysterious or secret

Composing Arcane I was transported to a world in my imagination; deep below the surface of the earth, standing in the middle of a vacuous cave with no signs of exit. It was pitch black and deafeningly silent, yet the silence was filled by the pure sine tones of my own tinnitus and the gentle hum of my body functioning. I metaphorically felt the weight of layers of earth above, but physically felt the air pressure, the drop in temperature. The weight of my own panic and fear at being in complete isolation bore down on my chest, pushing and willing itself to break free and to overwhelm. I explored the feeling of being completely alone and the not-quite-silence engulfing me, feeling the cold and hearing the tiny drops of water formed by condensation. Yet in my imagined isolation, I wondered at how one could block out the panic to notice the beauty of the earth. I imagined the way certain rocks and minerals reflected light off one another. The glimmers and flashes were delicate, beautiful and mysterious. Real tiny pockets of beauty and light hidden in the cold walls of a dark, isolating space and then, suddenly in my mind, these pockets began to morph into sound. Born out of an overactive imagination Arcane explores the mysteries, secrets and wonders that are experienced by few beneath the earth. How I could feel the experience so vividly without actually being there was both frightening and mysterious – a testament to the secrets of the mind.

Instrumentation: 
2 Flutes (1 = Piccolo & Flute, 2 = Flute & Piccolo)
2 Oboes (2 = Oboe & Cor Anglais)
2 Clarinets in Bb (2 = Bass Clarinet & Clarinet in Bb)
2 Bassoons (2 = Contrabassoon & Bassoon)

4 Horns in F 
2 Trumpets in C
2 Trombones 
1 Bass Trombone
1 Tuba 

1 Percussion 
Vibraphone, Crotales, 2 x Triangles (large & small), Suspended Cymbal, Double Bass Bow, Brushes and 2 x Triangle Beaters for Crotales, Tam-Tam, Glockenspiel
Timpani (5 drums)

Harp

Violins I
Violins II
Violas
Cellos
Double Basses

Full work duration: ca. 9"


Arcane (TSO) [Excerpt]

Commissioned by the Brisbane Philharmonic Orchestra (BPO) for flute and reduced orchestra, this is a live recording of the premiere performance.
Premiered by soloist, Jonathan Henderson (flute) and the BPO, conducted by Michael Keen on the 23rd of July, 2017 at the Old Museum, Brisbane, QLD. 
Recording courtesy of the BPO.

Inst: Solo Fl and 0, ca, 1+1, 1+1, - 0, 2, 2, 0, timp, perc, hp, cel, str.

Program Notes:

The Flute Concerto invites the listener to journey with the flute soloist as they navigate a unique, atmospheric orchestral sound-world. The landscape is still, but never stagnant and slowly expands in energy, textural shapes, momentum and transforming beauty. The harmonic language is an organic and colourful blend of diatonic and non-diatonic harmonies; blurring sonorities, chromatic flute lines and shifting perspectives of light and dark that each seek out a strange kind of harmonic beauty. There is no programmatic narrative to the Flute Concerto; its concerns are purely musical, creating an interesting relationship between soloist and orchestra. The audience is encouraged to listen for the shifting colours and isolation of timbres in the reduced instrumentation, with saturating divided strings, condensed woodwind and brass and very few tutti passages.  

Is the musical world at its chore: dark, beautiful, haunting, serene, at peace, unstable, in flux or all of the above? Where does the flute exist and how does it progress and transform? Does the orchestra influence the flute development or does the flute change the direction of the orchestra? Questioning is at the heart of the musical material. The work begins with closely related intervals often led by the divided high strings and auxiliary percussion filling the space as the flute slowly emerges from the atmospheric world, blurring the traditional concerto roles of orchestra and soloist as the material blends in the space or rises to the foreground. Framed and influenced by a virtuosic cadenza, the work is changed as the flute leads the orchestra towards new ground.

BPO - Pictures at an Exhibition and Bolero

Flute Concerto [live](flute & orchestra)

For Chamber Orchestra, written and performed at the 2012 AYO National Music Camp in Canberra. This piece explores the notion of 'forces at play' and is not afraid to get dark and crunchy :-)

Turbulence (chamber orchestra)

Original orchestral work by Lisa Cheney that includes an orchestration of the Russian folk song Along the Peterskaya performed by the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra. Conducted by Elena Schwarz.

Audio recorded by Toby Frost and Veronika Vincze of ABC Classic FM.

Lisa Cheney Echoes And Threads

This is a live recording with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Tiyani Lu. Recorded by the ABC on February 5, 2019 at the Iwaki Auditorium in Melbourne and shared with permission.

Penumbral Shadow was commissioned by the MSO for the 2018 Cybec 21st Century Composers' Program.

Program Note:
There are many types of shadows. The most famous shadows are witnessed during a solar and lunar eclipse when the moon’s shadow is cast on the earth, or the earth’s shadow falls on the moon. The ‘penumbra’ is the term for the special shaded outer region of the shadow cast by an opaque object. I have recently begun to find shadows a musical inspiration, an occasion for awe and gratitude. Where does a shadow begin and end? I am fascinated by the beauty that emerges from a shadows ‘perishability’, its fleeting moment in the spotlight, forever moving away from and towards light and darkness. The Japanese have a saying, ‘Mono no aware’, literally ‘the pathos of things’. It is used to describe an awareness of the sad or tragic beauty of impermanence and perishability, and it was present in my mind throughout the composition process. The Penumbral Shadow draws its inspiration from this notion of shadows, of light, darkness and fleeting beauty and seeks to explore this in music.

For more information or to contact the composer visit: www.lisacheney.com.au

Penumbral Shadow [chamber orchestra]

We’ve been Tasmania’s orchestra for over 75 years. We’re proud to be one of Australia’s leading performing arts companies and part of the DNA of Tasmanian cultural life – we have been inspiring, invigorating, and delighting audiences through music since 1948. We are recognised across the island and throughout the world for our distinctive artistic identity that is forged from our people and our place.