Dryad, for three vocal soloists, flute, harp, percussion and piano

I. Oread
II. Moonrise
III. To H.D.
IV. Ortus (Birth)
V. Flute Song
VI. Garden
VII. Wild Rose
VIII. April
IX. We Two

H.D. (Hilda Doolittle) is a hugely important literary and cultural figure whose influence is only now beginning to be appreciated, not only as a poet but also as a queer and feminist icon. "Dryad" combines poems written by, to and about H.D. and her lovers and literary collaborators Ezra Pound, Frances Gregg and Bryher. The cycle imagines a coded poetic dialogue between these literary figures, whose personal and professional lives intersected dramatically in the early decades of the twentieth century. Drawing on Classical Greek literary forms and mythological figures (among which, Narcissus and Echo, Artemis, Orpheus, Pygmalion, Dryads, Maenads), these texts call to one another in supplication, desire, possession, contempt, jealousy, struggle and resilience.

Dryad was a name with which other poets referred to H.D. – especially as it appears in the very late Ezra Pound Cantos:

"Dryad, your eyes are like the clouds over Taishan
When some of the rain has fallen
And half remains yet to fall
Dryad, thy peace is like water..."

I am extremely grateful to all involved, but especially to Susan Narucki for commissioning this work and supporting the music of our time, and to Kyle Adam Blair for his special role in bringing it to life. 



Christian Cummings, audio engineer
Alex Taylor, composer + conductor

Stefanie Quintin, soprano
Mariana Flores Bucio, soprano
Miguel Zazueta, tenor
Alexander Ishov, flutes
Mitchell Carlstrom, percussion
Tasha Smith Godinez, harp
Kyle Adam Blair, piano

Texts by H.D., Ezra Pound, Bryher, and Frances Gregg
Commissioned by Susan Narucki and kallisti ensemble
Recorded at UC San Diego by Christian Cummings
Cover photo by Alexander Ishov

Many thanks to Susan Narucki, Kyle Adam Blair, Christian Cummings, Andrew Munsey, Rebecca Lloyd-Jones, Yifan Guo, Lei Liang, Alex Stephenson, and all the performers.

Dryad (Studio Recording)

Improv Feb 26 2021

Mariana Flores Bucio, mezzo soprano
Alexander Ishov, flutes
Juliana Goana Villamizar, oboe + English Horn
Kosuke Matsuda, percussion
Ilana Waniuk, violin
Peter Ko, cello
Matthew Henson, double bass
Steven Schick, conductor

Audio from live performance 4 November 2021 at the Concert Hall of UC San Diego's Conrad Prebys Music Center



Sea Gods  
H.D. (1886 – 1961) 

I 

They say there is no hope— 
sand—drift—rocks—rubble of the sea— 
the broken hulk of a ship, 
hung with shreds of rope, 
pallid under the cracked pitch. 

They say there is no hope 
to conjure you— 
no whip of the tongue to anger you— 
no hate of words 
you must rise to refute. 

They say you are twisted by the sea, 
you are cut apart 
by wave-break upon wave-break, 
that you are misshapen by the sharp rocks, 
broken by the rasp and after-rasp. 

That you are cut, torn, mangled, 
torn by the stress and beat, 
no stronger than the strips of sand 
along your ragged beach. 

II 

But we bring violets, 
great masses—single, sweet, 
wood-violets, stream-violets, 
violets from a wet marsh. 

Violets in clumps from hills, 
tufts with earth at the roots, 
violets tugged from rocks, 
blue violets, moss, cliff, river-violets. 

Yellow violets' gold, 
burnt with a rare tint— 
violets like red ash 
among tufts of grass. 

We bring deep-purple 
bird-foot violets. 

We bring the hyacinth-violet, 
sweet, bare, chill to the touch— 
and violets whiter than the in-rush 
of your own white surf. 

III 

For you will come, 
you will yet haunt men in ships, 
you will trail across the fringe of strait 
and circle the jagged rocks. 

You will trail across the rocks 
and wash them with your salt, 
you will curl between sand-hills— 
you will thunder along the cliff— 
break—retreat—get fresh strength— 
gather and pour weight upon the beach. 

You will draw back, 
and the ripple on the sand-shelf 
will be witness of your track. 
O privet-white, you will paint 
the lintel of wet sand with froth. 

You will bring myrrh-bark 
and drift laurel-wood from hot coasts! 
when you hurl high—high— 
we will answer with a shout. 

For you will come, 
you will come, 
you will answer our taut hearts, 
you will break the lie of men's thoughts, 
and cherish and shelter us. 

 

(published in Sea Garden, 1916)

Sea Gods

Inclinations (2023) for 19 players

Conducted by Steve Schick, Jan 25 2023, Conrad Prebys Concert Hall, San Diego

Rose Lombardo, flutes
Teresa Diaz de Cossio, flutes
Carlos Felipe Rosas, oboes
Grace Talaski, clarinets
David Savage, bassoons
Darby Hinshaw, horn
Tricia Skye, horn
Rachel Allen, trumpet
Berk Schneider, trombone
Aaron McCalla, tuba
Camilo Zamudio, percussion
Tasha Smith Godinez, harp
Kate Hatmaker, violin
Myra Hinrichs, violin
Michael Molnau, viola
Andrew Waid, viola
Peter Ko, cello
Robbie Bui, cello
Matthew Henson, contrabass

Inclinations (Live Recording)

We Two

April (nympharum disjecta membra)

Wild Rose

Garden

Flute Song

Ortus (Birth)

To H.D.

Moonrise

Oread

Performers: Steven Schick, conductor; Wilfrido Terrazas, flute; Ellen Hindson, oboe; Grace Talaski, clarinet; Kosuke Matsuda, percussion; Kyle Adam Blair, piano; Miguel Zazueta, Natalia Merlano Gomez, Alex Taylor, voice; Amir Norouz Nasseri, Ilana Waniuk, violins; Myra Hinrichs, viola; Peter Ko, cello; Matthew Henson, bass

Production assistance from Alex Stephenson, David Espiritu and Jessica Flores 

---

Stylistically, Interviews resembles a collage: materials borrowed from Josquin, spectralism, Leonard Cohen, high modernism, elevator music, the poetry of Emily Dickinson and Kyle Adam Blair, Appalachian folk singing, bits recycled from my own pieces, the recorded voice of my mother, my own songs and poems. But collage is generally creating something new out of things that come from different places, disparate things; this feels more like a multifarious reflection of my own musical and personal world – things that all come from, or at least have been absorbed into, the same place, a musical inheritance or accumulation. I’ve always felt slightly unsure of the relationship between all of the many aspects (personas?) of my music making – sometimes they feel far away from each other, held in different compartments – but here I feel I’ve found a way for many of them to coexist in one place.

Conceptually, I think of Interviews as more concerned with storytelling than with aesthetics. Or at least, Interviews represents an intersection between musical and personal concerns. In the early stages of the Covid-19 pandemic, I undertook ethnographic research as part of my PhD coursework. For this I interviewed both my parents, Vicki and Trish, asking them all kinds of questions about their lives: what it was like for them growing up, how they came to terms with their sexuality, what it was like living through the politically tumultuous 1980s in New Zealand, how they went about starting a family, how it was for them when I came out. 

At the time, this was a really rewarding process of discovery and documentation, a way to learn new things about my family and where I’d come from, a way to feel connected to them across the Pacific during the enforced separation of the pandemic. Now, those interview recordings have other resonances. Trish was diagnosed with early onset dementia several years before we made the interviews; by the time we recorded them, her dementia had started to really affect her short term memory. Now, nearly four years later, her dementia is quite advanced, and many of those memories are gone for her. Looking back, the documentation of those memories is precious. 

The making of this piece has been both a way for me to hold on to that preciousness, those past perfect moments of connection, but also a way to process grief, the ongoing present of loss and change. In many ways Interviews occupies a threshold, between looking back and looking forward; it is both at once, acknowledging the messiness and multifacetedness of memory, not singular, smooth, or linear. I also see it as a small way of showing gratitude for both of my devoted, supportive, sensitive, beloved parents, and of celebrating Trish’s life.

Interviews (Live Recording)

Deepwalker for Solo Bb Clarinet by Alex Taylor

Natalie Harris, Clarinet

Text by Will Christie

Deepwalker

Justine Cormack, violin
James Bush, cello
Simon Martyn-Ellis, theorbo

Recorded by RNZ Concert at St Andrew's on The Terrace

on what grounds

Eric Moore solo cello, Kemp Recital Hall, Illinois State University 10.22.24

Differences

silk / gravel (2011)
Performed by Westlake Chamber Orchestra, cond. Mark Bennett


silk / gravel

Ben Hoadley, bassoon
New Zealand Symphony Orchestra
Hamish McKeich, conductor

Bassoon Concerto

2017-08-19 CD1

four little pieces for cello and piano - 1. langsam

old threads

[inner] for viola and orchestra 
NZSO cond. Hamish McKeich
Julia Joyce solo viola
recorded by radio new zealand concert at the michael fowler centre, wellington

[inner]

Music and Lyrics by Alex Taylor

Performed by Alex Taylor (vox, keys), Celeste Oram (backing vox, guitar, harmonium) and Keir Gogwilt (violin)

Adapted from 19th century folk songs, including 'The Dying Chief' and 
'Waihi Miner's Song', and a photograph in the Matakohe Kauri Museum

Lay Me Down demo

Performed by the Double Bass Fellows of the Tanglewood Music Center, conducted by Gemma New, coached by Todd Seeber
8 July 2018 Seiji Ozawa Hall

Descent

/dɪˈsɛnt/

noun

1                    An act of moving downwards, dropping, or falling.
1.1              A downward slope.
1.2              A moral, social, or psychological decline.

2                    The origin or background of a person in terms of family or nationality.
2.1              The transmission of qualities, property, or privileges by inheritance.

3                    A sudden violent attack.
3.1              An unexpected visit.

“I am in a prison: one wall is the avant-garde, the other wall is the past, and I want to escape.” – György Ligeti

This work is an exploration of moving downwards, in search of musical origins.

Many thanks to the basses of the Tanglewood Music Center, and to Todd Seeber, for his advice in the development of the work.

Descent

Abigail Sperling, flute
Auckland Chamber Orchestra, conducted by Peter Scholes

Recorded by Radio New Zealand, Tim Dodd and Adrian Hollay

Flute Concerto

I. Paisaje
II. La Guitarra
III. El Grito
IV. El Silencio
V. El Paso de La Siguiriya 
VI. Después de pasar
VII. Y Después

Live recording, January 24 2020 at Conrad Prebys Concert Hall, UC San Diego

Performed by 

Miguel Zazueta, tenor
Peter Ko, cello
Erin Graham, percussion

Text by Federico Garcia Lorca

Poema de La Siguiriya Gitana

Performed by Ensemble Proton Bern
Conducted by Gregor A. Mayrhofer

Flute/Alto Flute/Bass Flute : Bettina Berger
Oboe/Lupophone : Martin Bliggenstorfer
Clarinet/Bass Clarinet : Richard Haynes
Bassoon/Contraforte : Elise Jacoberger
Piano : Samuel Fried
Harp : Mathilde Bernard
Violin : Maximilian Haft
Violoncello : Jan-Filip Tulpa

in five movements

A Handful of False Starts and Dead Ends is the latest in a series of pieces exploring simple forms of linear motion. The musical language is deliberately flat, even two-dimensional, and utilises materials that seem to have become disused or left behind in a post-tonal contemporary context: diatonic scales and simple chords. The title suggests failure, giving up, botched attempts at progression or growth, problems without solution, the intractable and irreconcilable, and especially inertia or stymied momentum. The work is in five movements: three lethargic distant mirages intercut with two brief moments of pedantic immediacy.

Alex Taylor, Composer

Pinned to spotlight

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