Modern Notebook for April 23 - 29, 2023

Photo: composer Christopher Stark (photo credit: Laura Bianchi, courtesy of the Bogliasco Foundation)

On this week’s Modern Notebook with Tyler Kline: On the very first page of the sheet music for Christopher Stark’s piece “This is Not a Story,” the clarinetist is instructed to play “incredibly soft, make the audience listen.” The three movement work grows from there, moving through introspective music, to music that “sorts out Beethoven,” and concludes with a movement titled “Cecilia Sings the Music in Her Heart; Captain Leighton Bids Farewell.”


Then, Emma O’Halloran’s piece “Sum of its Parts” was created after spending hours with saxophonist Matthew Levy in a recording studio discussing and recording different sounds and techniques. The result was a vast catalog of coloristic elements that explores the full range of the saxophone, which went on to influence the piece.


Plus music by Benton Roark, Akemi Naito, Reena Esmail, Lei Liang, Jukka Tiensuu, and others; and performances by violist Kate Read, clarinetist Scott Andrews with the Calyx Piano Trio, Brooklyn Rider, Latitude 49, saxophonist Dylan Ward, Trio Klangspektrum, and more.

Hour 1

  • Falling Light by Deena T. Grossman.
  • Benton Roark’s Evennight.
  • Memory of the Woods by Akemi Naito.
  • Christopher Stark’s This is Not a Story
  • two Elliott Carter tributes by Jeffrey Mumford.
  • Reena Esmail’s Zeher (Poison).
  • Thread and Fray by Sarah Kirkland Snider.

Hour 2

  • Listening for Blossoms by Lei Liang.
  • Baljinder Sekhon’s Twelve Virtues.
  • Sum of its Parts by Emma O’Halloran.
  • Jukka Tiensuu’s Plus IV.

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