48 2014 Program Notes, Book 9
Friday, August 8 and Saturday, August 9, 2014
The Legend of the Northern Lights
Christopher Theofanidis (born in 1967)
The Legend of the Northern Lights
calls for piccolo, two flutes,
two oboes, English horn, E-flat clarinet, two B-flat clarinets,
bass clarinet, two bassoons, contrabassoon, four horns, three
trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion, harp
and strings. The performance time is 30 minutes. This is the
work’s world premiere.
CHRISTOPHER THEOFANIDIS
(b. 1967) is one of the more widely performed
American composers of his generation. He regularly writes for a variety of musical
genres, from orchestral and chamber music to opera and ballet. His work,
Rainbow
Body
, which is loosely based on a melodic fragment of Hildegard of Bingen, is one of
the most performed orchestral works of the past decade, and has been programmed
by over 120 orchestras internationally. Mr. Theofanidis’ works have been performed by
such groups as the New York Philharmonic, the London Symphony, the Philadelphia
Orchestra, the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, and the Moscow Soloists, and he has
a long-standing relationship with the Atlanta Symphony and Maestro Robert Spano.
Several of his works have been recorded by that ensemble on the TELARC label. In
2007, he was composer of the year for the Pittsburgh Symphony, for whom he wrote
a violin concerto with the soloist Sarah Chang. Mr. Theofanidis has written widely for
the stage, from a work for the American Ballet Theatre, to multiple dramatic pieces,
including
The Refuge
for the Houston Grand Opera and
Heart of a Soldier
for the
San Francisco Opera. His large-scale piece,
The Here and Now
, for soloists, chorus,
and orchestra, based on poetry of Rumi, was nominated for a Grammy award in
2007. Mr. Theofanidis is currently on the faculty of Yale University and has taught at
the Peabody Conservatory and the Juilliard School. He is also a fellow of the US-
Japan’s Leadership Program. This summer, Mr. Theofanidis will serve as artist faculty
at the Aspen Music Festival and as Master Artist at the Atlantic Center for the Arts.
Of
The Legend of the Northern Lights
, written in collaboration with KV 265
and Emmy-nominated astronomer and visual artist Dr. José Francisco Salgado,
Christopher Theofanidis wrote, “KV 265’s admirable goal of fusing science with the
arts appeals to me very deeply, as I have always thought that the most profound
aspirations of humanity can be found in both disciplines. In the case of
The Legend
of the Northern Lights
, the vehicle for bringing these two things together is a simple
children’s story told through narration, music and video, and it is one that tries to
underscore the idea that the journey of evolving is driven by our basic need to both
admire and to understand something technically.
“The story begins with a child looking into the night sky and asking questions of
a grandparent — ‘how many stars are there?’, ‘how old is the moon?’, and the like.
The final question, ‘what are the northern lights,’ starts the grandparent ruminating
on how since the beginning of time, humankind has tried to answer these kind of
questions — to explain what seems inexplicable — and has come up with answers
reflecting the values of the time and the individuals searching for explanations.
The grandparent explains that even in their own family there was a legend of the
Northern Lights, and the rest of the story proceeds narratively from there.
“It has been exhilarating to work with both the story-telling and filmic components
of this work. The music tries to respond to both of these elements in a synthesized
way — allowing moments of one or the other to dominate depending on the arc of
the narrative, as opera does with language, drama and music.”
©2014 Dr. Richard E. Rodda
