"Particularly lovely was Peter
Jarvis on marimba, whose delicate, hollow and carefully placed notes epitomized
the haunting power of the second movement."
-
Princeton Packet - June 7, 1989
Thursday March 11, 2004
Open Rehearsal 10 :00 - 11:30
Concert - 12:30
Panel Discussion following the concert
Program
The Earth Only
Endures (2003)
Jerome Kitzke
for Percussion Solo
Thomas Kolor
The Animist Child
(1994)
Jerome Kitzke
for Toy Piano/Vocals
Jerome Kitzke
The Paha Sapa Give-Back
(1993)
Jerome Kitzke
for Percussion Quartet, Piano
and Vocals
Joseph Bergen, Justin Wolf, April McCloskey,
Michael Sperone - Drum Set, Vocals
David Weisberg – Piano, Vocals
Peter Jarvis – Conductor, Vocals
Panel
Jerome Kitzke
Peter Jarvis, Thomas Kolor, Jeffrey Kresky, John Link
David Weisberg - Moderator
Program Notes
The Earth Only Endures is an
anti-war piece written in response to America’s invasion of Iraq in the spring
of 2003. In choosing to use the same text found in my 1991 anti-Gulf War work,
Mad Coyote Madly Sings, I sought to express not just the same sentiments
of opposition I felt then, but also my sad and angry astonishment at how little
has changed in the twelve intervening years. Seeking to add words referential
to the young women and men still losing their lives as of this writing, I added
Walt Whitman’s Reconciliation from the Drum Taps section of
Leaves of Grass. This work is dedicated to one my god daughters, Genevieve
Windbiel, four years old, that she may spend the rest of her life at peace.
The Earth
Only Endures was commissioned by
percussionist Tom Kolor and underwritten by the American Composers Forum with
funds from the Jerome Foundation. Thanks to all of them. Mr. Kolor performed
the premiere on September 13, 2003 at St. Peter’s Church in New York City.
The Animist Child
is a stomp on the earth for the beginning of life: a baby born who
instinctively embraces the soul inherent in all things. It is dedicated to Bix
Karl Windbiel, born June 30, 1994. This work was written for Wendy Mae Chambers
and premiered by her on July 21, 1994 in New York City.
The vocal
line should be performed with an intense and playful theatrical verve, varying
the shape and form of the repeated phrases, and improvising pitch levels as well
as vocal quality.
The Paha Sapa Give-Back
is an exhortation for all of us to pay attention to and act upon the sovereignty
and sacred land claim issues of the world’s indigenous peoples. Paha Sapa is
Lakota for Black Hills. They call them “the heart of everything that is”. Since
the 1870’s, the Lakota have been struggling on the battlefield and in the
courtroom to protect and reclaim the Black Hills, which had been declared
legally theirs by the 1868 Ft. Laramie Treaty. Soon after the 1874 discovery of
gold in the Black Hills came a series of illegal land deals that robbed the
Lakota of their holy land. In 1975 the U.S. Court of Claims called the
government’s conduct toward the Lakota in all probability “the most ripe and
rank case of dishonorable dealings” in U.S. history. The government’s response
was to offer money as compensation, which the Lakota refused then and continue
to refuse now. What they want and deserve are honorable dealings in regard to
the land return legislation now awaiting reintroduction in congress. It seems
naïve to think that we, as recent occupants of the land, can ever hope to
relieve the social ills that plague us without first attending to the
dishonorable dealings foisted upon the original inhabitants during the creation
of this country. In spirit-opposition of the traditional Indian ‘give-away’,
The Paha Sapa Give-Back suggests that we do just that! Give the land back
and attend the flower that blooms from the act.
While I am
grateful for the obvious influence of the Plains Indian music in the work,
The Paha Sapa Give-Back contains no actual tunes or forms from that music.
Mad Coyote Madly Sings (1991), We Need to Dream All This Again
(1993), The Paha Sapa Give-Back (1993), and Woope (1994) form a
quartet of works that deal with the Black Hills land issues. The Paha Sapa Give–Back was written for essential
Music and is dedicated to all the people still fighting for the rights to their
sacred lands. Thanks to Charles Wood and John Kennedy.
—Jerome Kitzke
Biographical Information
Jerome Kitzke lives in New York City
but grew up along the southwestern shore of Lake Michigan in Milwaukee,
where he was born in 1955. Since his first work in 1970, he has thought himself
to be as much a storyteller as he is a composer. Some of the stories are about
life's personal roads, like The Redness of Blood and Sunflower Sutra
which both express the composer's love for his blood family. Many, however, like
Box Death Hollow and The Paha Sapa Give-Back are about the roads
that go looking for what it means to be an American early in the 21st Century,
especially as it relates to the connection between how we live on this land and
the way we came to live on it. Kitzke's music celebrates American vitality in
its purest forms. It thrives on the spirit of driving jazz, plains Indian song,
and Beat Generation poetry, where freedom and ritual converge. It is direct,
dramatic, and visceral — always with an ear to the sacred ground.
Mr. Kitzke
composes for and performs with his group The Mad Coyote. His music has been
performed in North and South American, Europe, Asia and Australia by such
organizations as the Milwaukee Symphony, the New Juilliard Ensemble, Essential
Music (New York), Present Music (Milwaukee), Earplay (San Francisco), and
Zeitgeist (Minneapolis-St. Paul), Trio AKKOBASSO (Germany) and such artists as
Guy Klucevsek, Margaret Leng Tan, Kathleen Supové, Michael Lowenstern, Christine
Schadeberg, Dora Ohrenstein, Wendy Chambers, Anthony de Mare, Lisa Karrer, Tom
Kolor and Tom Linker.
Mr. Kitzke's
first CD, “The Character of American Sunlight,” is available from Koch
International Classics (3-7456-2 H1), and his piece Haunted America is
available on a compilation disc released by Present Music on the Innova Label
(Innova 590). Current commissions include the Kronos Quartet and Tales and
Scales.
The Mad
Coyote - Jerome Kitzke founded the ensemble The Mad Coyote in 1992 to present
concerts combining his notated pieces and free improvisation. The group consists
of piano, accordion, violin, bass, flute/voice, bass clarinet, tenor saxophone,
trumpet, solo voice, two percussion, and conductor; though Kitzke often uses
smaller ensembles drawn from the group. Each member can play with equal aplomb
the most complex notated music and music that is totally improvised.
Cited by the
New York Times as "a virtuosic percussionist", Tom Kolor specializes is
20th and 21st century music, and holds degrees from William Paterson University
and the Juilliard School.
As a chamber
musician, Mr. Kolor has appeared throughout the world as a member of the Talujon
Percussion Quartet, New Jersey Percussion Ensemble, Ensemble Sospeso, Newband,
and Ensemble 21. He is a frequent guest of such groups as Speculum Musicae, The
Group for Contemporary Music, Da Capo Chamber Players, Continuum, the Chamber
Music Society of Lincoln Center, the Orchestra of St. Luke's, and the Orpheus
Chamber Orchestra.
As a soloist,
Mr. Kolor has premiered works by a wide range of composers such as Milton
Babbitt, Wayne Peterson, John Zorn, Tania Leon, and Jerome Kitzke in venues such
as New York's MOMA and Guggenheim, Weill Recital Hall, Holland's State Museum at Amsterdam, Princeton
University, and California's State University at Berkeley.
Mr. Kolor has
recorded for Koch, New World, Albany, Wergo, Pollyrhythm, Capstone, RCA
Classics, and North/South Consonance labels, and is currently teaching at
William Paterson University, SUNY Purchase, and Columbia University.
Peter
Jarvis graduated from William Paterson
University, Wayne New Jersey. As co-director of the highly acclaimed New Jersey
Percussion Ensemble Jarvis is active as a percussionist, conductor,
administrator and educator. He has played with the Chamber Music Society of
Lincoln Center, the Group for Contemporary Music, the Contemporary Chamber
Ensemble of Piccolo Spoleto, the Composers Guild of New Jersey Performance
Ensemble, newband, New York Art Ensemble, and countless other groups including
several orchestras. Jarvis has appeared as a soloist for ISCM League of
Composers in New York and numerous new music
festivals including the “Europe Asia Festival” in Kazan Russia. As conductor,
Jarvis has appeared with Saint Luke's Chamber Ensemble, Cygnus Festival
Orchestra, The Chamber Music Ensemble of Piccolo Spoleto, Composers Guild of New
Jersey Performance Ensemble, Ensemble 21, on the San Francisco Symphony’s New
and Unusual Music Series and many others. Jarvis has appeared in the United
States, Mexico, Canada, Asia, Russia and Europe. He can be heard on Nonesuch,
CRI, Koch International, Composers Guild of New Jersey, October Music (recording
for ECM), Capstone, NAXOS, Gram recording labels and others.
In addition
to performing, Jarvis has been active as a teacher, having taught percussion and
chamber music at Fairleigh Dickinson University and currently at Connecticut
College and William Paterson University.
The New Jersey Percussion Ensemble was founded in 1968 by Raymond DesRoches. The group is co-directed by Peter Jarvis and Gary Van Dyke. This highly acclaimed ensemble is made up of professionals and students from William Paterson University, where it has been in residence since 1972. Because of the ensemble's commitment to the performance and development of percussion repertoire, numerous pieces have been written for, premiered by and recorded by the NJPE. The New Jersey Percussion Ensemble has appeared in the United States and Europe as guests of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, the Group for Contemporary Music, the Composers Guild of New Jersey, the San Francisco Symphony, the Gaudeamus Foundation, Radio Denmark, and countless others. The group can be heard on Nonesuch, Composer's Recording Inc., Music and Arts, Koch International, Desoto, New World, NAXOS, the Composers Guild of New Jersey and Capstone recording labels.
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