The use of cameras or recording equipment during the 

performance is not allowed. Please be sure that cell phones,

pagers, and other electronic devices are turned off.

Please note that late entry or reentry ofthe 

National Gallery ofArt after 6:30 pm is not permitted.

For the convenience of concertgoers, 

the Garden Cafe remains open for light refreshments

until 6:00 pm on Sundays.

Music Department

National Gallery ofArt

Sixth Street and Constitution Avenue nw

Washington, DC

www.nga.gov

cover: John Cage, Where There is Where There— Urban Landscape, 1987-1989, monotype

on Stonehenge paper, Gift of Crown Point Press © John Cage Trust

The Seventy-second Season of

The William Nelson Cromwell and F. Lammot Belin

Concerts

National Gallery of Art

65th American Music Festival

November 3,10, and 17, 2013

Sunday Evenings, 6:30 pm

November 6 and 13, 2013

Wednesdays, 12:10 pm

Admissionfree
A message from guest artistic director Celeste Headlee

Welcome to the Sixty-fifth American Music Festival at the National Gallery of

Art. First presented in 1944, at a time when nearly all major orchestras were

still playing solely European masters, this festival expresses the Gallery’s

long-term commitment to music by American composers. Those among

them who are bent on developing their own voice and style have typically

struggled to get their music performed, encountering resistance from

presenters who were concerned about ticket sales and from music critics

who were reluctant to accept new trends. The New Orleans composer Louis

Moreau Gottschalk (1829-1869) once used the prejudice ofmusic critics to

play a prank on them at his concert. Fie identified a piece ofhis own in the

printed program as a work by Beethoven, and a lesser-known Beethoven

piece as written by Gottschalk. In his review the next day, critic John Sullivan 

Dwight tore apart what he thought was Gottschalk’s piece as “amateurish

inanities,” while praising what he thought was Beethoven. After the review 

was published, the composer sent a note apologizing for the “printer’s error”

in the program, but wryly thanking Dwight for the praise.

Throughout the nineteenth century, most Americans interacted with

music at their churches or at local band concerts. Even tiny hamlets and

villages had village bands, with the postmaster playing the tuba and the

schoolteacher on bass drum. These bands would create their own arrangements ofWagner and Verdi melodies and play them along with the latest

march by John Philip Sousa (1854-1932). Successful in his own time—

thanks to the prominent post he occupied as conductor ofthe United States

Marine Band—Sousa received little respect from critics. Nevertheless, his

masterful reinvention of European march music resulted in music that is

considered uniquely American.

A few nineteenth-century composers experimented with music they 

thought was distinctly American, among them Edward MacDowell (1860-

1908), who incorporated pseudo- Native American melodies into his “Woodland Sketches” for piano (1896). The Fisk Jubilee Singers, founded in 1871,

specialized in spiritual arrangements by Nathaniel Dett (1882-1943), Ffarry T.

Burleigh (1866-1949), and other composers, which they performed with

3
considerable success in Europe and the United States. But it was the Czech

composer Antonin Dvorak (1841—1904) who did the most to bestow a mantle

ofrespectability on American music in the nineteenth century. In 1892,

shortly after becoming director ofthe National Conservatory of Music in

New York, he made public statements indicating that his goal was to discover

true “American music.” To the chagrin ofmany ofhis Eurocentric American 

colleagues, he was quoted in the New York Herald praising, of all things,

African American melodies: “I am now satisfied... that the future music of

this country must be founded upon what are called Negro melodies....There 

is nothing in the whole range of composition that cannot be supplied with 

themes from this source.”

Subsequent composers have discovered abundant American sources 

from which themes can be drawn, including Appalachian, Creole, Cuban, 

South American, and, of course, the music of hundreds of American Indian

tribes. In an article for New Music, composer and editor Frank Oteri (b. 1964)

wrote: “Being American is about having a mixed tradition, a mixed heritage,

a mixed set of ancestry, a mixed set ofideals... Is there an American musical

style? I don’t think there is.”

Noting the presence at the Gallery oftwo exhibitions— Yes, No, Maybe:

Artists Working at Crown Point Press and Tell It with Pride: The 54th Massachusetts Regiment and Augustus Saint-Gaudens’ Shaw Memorial—the Sixty-fifth

American Music Festival juxtaposes music by John Cage (one ofthe artists

who worked at Crown Point Press) with music that has African American

roots. In addition, it features Steve Antosca’s habitat, a new work written

specifically to be played in the Gallery’s East Building Atrium, and the world

premiere ofJohn Supko’s All Souls, which the composer describes as part

melodrama, part radio play, part opera.”

This festival is diverse, unique, and multi-faceted, just like American

music. Out ofthe mishmash oftunes, instruments, accents, and rhythms

that is American music, our composers have created order out of chaos. The 

perceived conflict between the rags Scott Joplin pounded out in Midwestern 

brothels and the chamber music ofmodernists like Charles Ives (1874-1954)

or Milton Babbitt (1916-2011) is not a conflict at all, but two sides ofthe

same coin that spends as well as any other musical currency. I find myself

4

agreeing with Kyle Gann, who wrote recently in an essay for American Public

Media: “How can we find our national voice in classical music? By accepting 

and appreciating all the disparate parts of our divided but indivisible nation. 

It’s not either a violin or a fiddle; it’s both. And that’s a beautifully American thing.”

The granddaughter ofnoted American composer William Grant Still, Celeste Headlee

is a classically trained soprano who has peformed at the National Gallery and

the Michigan Opera Theater as well as in recital throughout the United States.

Currently active as a hostfor National Public Radio and pbs World News, she

often makes special appearances on cnn and has contributed articles to Chamber

Music magazine. As guest artistic director, she guided the choice ofpeforming

musicians and repertoirefor the Sixty-fifth American Music Festival.

5
2,962nd Concert 

November 3, 2013

West Building, West Garden Court

Maryland Sinfonietta

Michael Jacko, conductor

Andrew McLaughlin, baritone

Presented in honor of

Yes, No, Maybe: Artists Working at Crown Point Press

and

Tell It with Pride: The 54th Massachusetts Regiment and

Augustus Saint-Gaudens’ Shaw Memorial

Charles Ives (1874-1954)

Charlie Rutlage (1920), arr. Michael Jacko

General William Booth Enters into Heaven (1913), arr. John J. Becker

Three Places in New England (Orchestral set no. 1) (1914)

The “St. Gaudens” in Boston Common

(Col. Shaw and his Colored Regiment)

Putnam’s Camp, Redding, Connecticut

The Housatonic at Stockbridge

INTERMISSION

John Cage (1912-1992)

In a Landscape (1948), arr. Justin Messina

Aaron Copland (1900-1990)

Appalachian Spring (Balletfor Martha) (1944)

6

The Musicians

MARYLAND SINFONIETTA

Founded in 2004 by Maurice Boyer and Shy-Luen Chen, then graduate

conducting students at the University of Maryland School of Music, the 

Maryland Sinfonietta consists ofstudents and recent graduates ofthe 

university. Serving as a vehicle for the students to present extracurricular, 

large-ensemble concerts, the group has performed symphonies by Carl

Nielsen and Jean Sibelius.

Performing in the Maryland Sinfonietta this evening are:

Victoria Bergeron, Jordan Johnson, Celaya Kirchner, Melanie Kuperstein,

Allison Reisinger, Katherine Smolen, Aurora Wheeland, and Sarah York, violin

Nora Lee, Karl Mitze, and Michael Sinni, viola

Jessica Albrecht, Jonathan Cain, and Geoffrey Manyin, cello

Ben Anderson and James Hein, bass

Angelina Ho,flute

Jenny Lehtonen, piccolo

Amanda Dusold, oboe

Elise Bond, clarinet

Ronn Hall, bassoon

Laura Bent, horn

Avery Boddie, trumpet

Corey Sansolo, trombone

Nicholas Obrigewitch, tuba

Luis Reyes and Alexei Ulitin, piano

Laurin Friedland and Robert Schroyer, percussion

MICHAEL JACKO

Since arriving in the Washington, DC, area in 2010 to attend the University

of Maryland, Michael Jacko has served as music director ofthe University of

Maryland Repertoire Orchestra and assistant conductor ofthe Capital City

Symphony, the University of Maryland Symphony Orchestra, and the Youth

Orchestras of Prince William. A concert assistant at the National Gallery of

7
Art, Jacko’s duties include preparation for possible cover conducting for all

concerts ofthe National Gallery ofArt Orchestra.

Originally a trumpet player, Jacko began his conducting studies while

pursuing a degree from the Faculty of Languages and Linguistics at Georgetown University. While at Georgetown, he conducted the University Wind

Ensemble and Symphony Orchestra. He completed further studies at Bard

College and the University of Denver, where he served as assistant conductor to various instrumental, choral, and operatic ensembles. While at Bard,

he coordinated and conducted a string ensemble for Noemie LaFrance’s

site-specific ballet, Rapture, staged atop the Frank Gehry-designed Richard B.

Fisher Center, and conducted performances with the nearby Woodstock

Chamber Orchestra. A former pupil of Lawrence Golan, Harold Farberman, 

Rufus Jones Jr., James Ross, and Michael Votta, Jacko has taught undergraduate conducting at the University of Maryland and Towson University.

ANDREW MCLAUGHLIN

Praised for his artful interpretations of opera, art song, and concert repertoire, baritone Andrew McLaughlin has performed in Ravel’s L’enfant et les

sortileges, Rossini’s II Barbiere di Siviglia, Catan’s Florencia en el Amazonas,

and Bizet’s Carmen. He made his debut with the Capital City Symphony during their 2012 season in Mahler’s Lieder einesfahrenden Gesellen, and in April

2013 he joined the University of Maryland Repertoire Orchestra as the featured soloist in Orffs Carmina Burana and the world premiere of Debussy’s

La Saulaie, a newly reconstructed poeme for baritone and orchestra. Most

recently, McLaughlin had the honor ofjoining famed mezzo-soprano

Frederica von Stade and conductor Timothy Long in Dominic Argento’s A

Few Words About Chekhov to close out the University of Maryland’s Art of

Argento Festival. A former pupil of baritones Randall Scarlata and Dominic 

Cossa, McLaughlin holds degrees in vocal performance from West Chester

University of Pennsylvania and the Maryland Opera Studio.

Program Notes

Though his most earnest work demonstrated deep reverence for the European classical tradition, Charles Ives never sought to conceal the influence

upon him ofthe Protestant hymn, American folk music, and ragtime. Ives’

ability to synthesize various American musical styles and traditional European forms into a single, powerful voice resulted in unprecedented developments in symphonic music, even as his musical independence and penchant for experimentation made him a true American visionary.

A robust and animated vignette from Ives’ collection ofmore than two

hundred songs, Charlie Rutlage tells the story of a tragic day on the xit

ranch, one ofthe largest cattle ranches in Texas history, which operated from

1885 to 1912. Placid, consonant offbeats begin and conclude the song, but

brutal cross-rhythms and eventual pandemonium accompany the rising

intensity ofthe story, so much so that Ives instructs the soloist to recite the 

text (unpitched) to project over the accompaniment.

William Booth, a British Methodist preacher, founded the Christian

Mission in 1865 and eventually renamed it the Salvation Army in 1878.

Following his death in 1912, American poet Vachel Lindsay (1879-1931)

penned a poem in honor ofthe Salvation Army’s first “General.” Originally

published in Poetry magazine in January 1913, the poem was meant to be

sung to the tune ofthe Salvation Army Hymn “Washed in the Blood ofthe 

Lamb” and accompanied by the instruments indicated therein. This drew an 

enthusiastic response from Ives, who used various hymns and gospel songs 

to create what he called a “glory trance” of a song. Ives’ friend and fellow

New England composer Carl Ruggles (1876-1971) singled out this song,

insisting: “Ifhe never wrote but one song he would have been a great

composer. That’s General Booth Goes to Fieaven [sic]... It’s a song of genius, 

that’s all.”

The first of Ives’ large-scale orchestral works to receive its premiere in

full, Three Places in New England was completed in 1914 but not heard in 

public until 1929. Nicolas Slonimsky (1894-1995), a champion of new 

music in the 1920s and 1930s, conducted the work in New York and Paris

with his Boston Chamber Orchestra, though reduced orchestral forces

9
necessitated a reduction in scoring: Ives transferred many ofthe wind and

brass parts to the piano, an instrument he had excluded from the original

score. The arrangement for small orchestra used in this evening’s performance is by James Sinclair.

The first movement, “‘St. Gaudens’ in Boston Common,” which the

composer also labeled the “Black March,” represents Ives’ musical impression ofAugustus Saint-Gaudens’ majestic sculpture. Cast in bronze and

unveiled at the northern corner of Boston Common in 1897, the has relief

depicts Colonel Robert Gould Shaw leading the Massachusetts 54th Regiment, the first enlisted regiment ofAfrican American soldiers, into the

Second Battle of Fort Wagner (near Charleston, South Carolina) in 1863. In

1898 Saint-Gaudens completed a second, plaster-cast version ofthe sculpture, which is the focus ofthe National Gallery exhibition Tell It with Pride:

The 54th Massachusetts Regiment and Augustus Saint-Gaudens’ Shaw Memorial.

The exhibition remains on view in the West Building until January 20, 2014.

The primary musical device employed by Ives in the first movement is

the minor third interval, adapted and developed from folk song material—

both descending, as in Stephen Foster’s “Old Black Joe” (I’m coming!) and

ascending, as in “Marching through Georgia” (Hurrah!). The tempo, however,

is slowed to a degree that completely transfigures the tunes. What begins as

an ironic transformation ofpeppy folk songs results in a sober, soulful meditation on the courage ofthe 54th Regiment in the face of possible annihilation.

The memorial on Boston Common would have had special significance for 

Ives. On the occasion ofthe mustering ofthe 54th Massachusetts Regiment

in 1863, the troops paraded through the streets of Boston to the accompaniment of a military band. The conductor ofthe band on that occasion was 

Charles Ives’ father, George Ives.

A combination oftwo prior works for theater orchestra, Country Band

March and Overture and March 1776, “Putnam’s Camp” accompanies the

narrative of a child’s dream at a picnic on the Fourth ofJuly. The movement

begins with a raucous town band scene, and eventually the child steals away

to the forest. His surreal vision of Lady Liberty is interrupted by a curious

phenomenon: two marching bands at opposite ends of a field, playing different tunes in different tempos—one ofthe most famous moments in all

10

ofIves’ output. This polyrhythmic episode yields to the 1776 march, which

culminates in a delightful rumpus. Ives commented to Slonimsky after the

premiere, “Just like a town meeting—every man for himself. Wonderful

how it came out!”

About “The Housatonic at Stockbridge,” Ives wrote that is was based on

a “Sunday morning walk that Mrs. Ives and I took near Stockbridge the summer after we were married. We walked in the shadows along the [Housatonic] 

river. The mist had not entirely left the river bed, and the colors, the running water, the banks and elm trees were something that one would always

remember.” The initial idea was only a few bars long—Ives began with a

complex texture consisting oflush C-sharp major harmonies in the low

strings, soft tremolo thirds in the second violins sounding quite distant

from the home key, and wandering background lines in the violas and first

violins. As the text describes the river’s increasing restlessness and intensity,

Ives builds his setting to a fever pitch before concluding with a brief vision

ofthe opening mood.

Soon after his invention ofthe prepared piano, John Cage composed In

a Landscape for dancer Louise Lippold. Caught up in the minimalist movement, Cage deliberately chose a limited harmonic language, including only 

eight ofthe twelve possible chromatic tones throughout the whole piece. 

Based in D minor, the tonality shifts between the Dorian and natural minor

modes, using b-flat as the only accidental. Cage also elects to sustain particular

notes that shift between consonance and dissonance relative to the primary

flowing line. The result is a simple piece that sounds expansive well beyond

its means.

Written for choreographer and dancer Martha Graham, Aaron Copland’s

Appalachian Spring premiered in its original version for thirteen instruments

at the Library ofCongress in October 1944, earning Aaron Copland the Pulitzer

Prize for music the following year. Copland developed the work without a

descriptive title—the only one he had in mind was the affectionate subtitle,

“Ballet for Martha.” Graham later suggested “Appalachian Spring” from a

line of Hart Crane’s poem The Dance, and for this reason any association

between Copland’s score and the Appalachian region is coincidental.

11
Set in Pennsylvania in 1830, the story relates to the construction of

a

farmhouse fora young couple about to wed. Though folklike in character,

the music is Copland’s own throughout, with the sole exception ofthe

Shaker hymn “Simple Gifts” toward the end ofthe piece. Though Copland

gained greater fame through his career from the full orchestral adaptation of

Appalachian Spring, the original version remains quaint, sincere, and delight­

fully intimate.

SONG TEXTS

Charlie Rutlage

From Cowboy Songs and other Frontier Ballads

Collected by John A. Lomax

Another good cowpuncher has gone to meet his fate, I hope he’ll find a resting place, within the golden gate.

Another place is vacant on the ranch ofthe XIT, ‘twill be hard to find another, that’s liked as well as he.

The first that died was Kid White,a man both tough and brave,

while Charlie Rutlage makes the third to be sent to his grave.

Caused bya cow-horse falling, while running after stock, ‘twas on the spring round up, a place where death men mock.

He went forward one morning ona circle through the hills,

he was gay and full of glee, and free from earthly ills.

But when it came to finish up the work on which he went,

nothing came back from him; his time on earth was spent. ‘Twas as he rode the round up, an XIT turned back to the herd;

Poor Charlie shoved him in again, his cutting horse he spurred.

Another turned at that moment, his horse the creature spied,

and turned and fell with him; beneath poor Charlie died.

His relations in Texas, his face never more will see, 

butI hope he’ll meet his loved ones beyond in eternity.

I hope he’ll meet his parents, will meet them face to face,

and that they’ll grasp him by the right hand at the shining

throne of grace.

12

General William Booth Enters into Heaven

Vachel Lindsay

Booth led boldly with his big bass drum

(Are you washed in the blood ofthe Lamb?)

The Saints smiled gravely and they said,“He’s come.”

(Are you washed in the blood ofthe Lamb?)

Walking lepers followed rank on rank,

Lurching bravos from the ditches dank

Drabs from the alleyways, drug fiends pale 

Minds still passion ridden, soul powers frail:

Vermin eaten saints with moldy breath,

Unwashed legions with the ways of Death

(Are you washed in the blood ofthe Lamb?)

Ev’ry slum had sent its halfa score

The round world over (Booth had groaned for more).

Ev’ry banner that the wide world flies

Bloomed with glory and transcendent dyes,

Big voiced lasses made their banjoes bang,

Tranced, fanatical they shrieked and sang;

“Are you washed in the blood ofthe Lamb?”

Hallelujah! It was queer to see

Bull necked convicts with that land make free.

Loons with trumpets blowna blare, blare, blare,

On, on, upward thro’ the golden air!

(Are you washed in the blood ofthe Lamb?)

Jesus came from the courthouse door,

Stretched his hands above the passing poor.

Booth saw not, but led his queer ones there

Round and round the mighty courthouse square.

Yet! in an instant all that bleak review 

Marched on spotless, clad in raiment new.

The lame were straightened, withered limbs uncurled,

And blind eyes opened ona new, sweet world.

*3
The Housatonic at Stockbridge

Robert Underwood Johnson

Contented river in thy dreamy realm 

The cloudy willow and the plumy elm:

Thou beautiful! from ev’ry dreamy hill

What eye but wanders with thee at thy will.

Contented river! And yet over-shy

To mask thy beauty from the eager eye;

Hast thou a thought to hide from field and town?

In some deep current ofthe sunlit brown.

Ah! there’s a restive ripple,

And kind the swift red leaves

September’s firstlings faster drift;

Wouldst thou away, dear stream?

Come, whisper near!

I also ofmuch resting have a fear;

Let me tomorrow thy companion be,

By fall and shallow to the adventurous sea!

Program notes by Michael Jacko, music program specialist, National Gallery ofArt

M

2,963rd Concert

November 6, 2013

East Building Auditorium

CutTime Simfonica

Rick Robinson, director

“Down by the Riverside: Reconstructionism in Classical Music”

Presented in honor of

Tell It with Pride: The 54th Massachusetts Regiment and

Augustus Saint-Gaudens’ Shaw Memorial

The performer will introduce each workfrom the stage.

Scott Joplin (1867-1917)

The Entertainer Rag (1902)

Edward Kennedy “Duke” Ellington (1899-1974) and

Mercer Ellington (1919-1996)

King ofthe Magi from Three Black Kings (1974)

William Grant Still (1895-1978)

Symphony No. 1 (Afro-American) (1930)

Animato

15
Rick Robinson (b. 1963)

Gitcha Groove On! (2009)

Adolphus Hailstork (b. 1941)

Symphony No. 1 (1988)

Adagio

Edward Kennedy “Duke” Ellington (1899-1974) and

Mercer Ellington

“Martin Luther King” from Three Black Kings (1974)

Robinson

Highland Park, mi: City ofTrees (2009)

16

The Musicians

CUTTIME SIMFONICA

Launched in 2010 by bassist Rick Robinson as the second outreach ensemble of Detroit Symphony Orchestra musicians, CutTime Simfonica® is a

versatile string sextet that has to date premiered two dozen compositions

and transcriptions by Robinson. The compositions won a Kresge Artist

Fellowship that has enabled the CutTime ensemble to share art music with

classical newcomers, especially in nontraditional settings such as bars and 

clubs. Now an independent production company, CutTime recently won 

recognition from Crain’s Detroit Business as a social entrepreneur and a

grant from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation for community

engagement events in Detroit. The ensemble maintains a website at www.

cuttime.com.

Members ofCutTime Simfonica participating in today’s concert are:

Joseph Scheer, violin 1

Sonya Hayes, violin 11

Chiara Dieguez, viola 1

Heidi Remick, viola 11

Sean Neidlinger, violoncello

Rick Robinson, bass and director

17
RICK ROBINSON

Born into the fourth generation of a musical family from Detroit, Michigan,

bassist, composer, and director Rick Robinson was introduced to the cello

and the string bass in public schools. He subsequently honed his performance and leadership skills at the Interlochen Arts Academy, Cleveland

Institute of Music, and New England Conservatory of Music. He held

principal bass positions with the Canton and Akron (Ohio) orchestras, the

Portland (Maine) Symphony, and the Boston Pops Esplanade Orchestra

under the direction ofJohn Williams. A frequent substitute for the symphony orchestras of Boston and Detroit, he was invited to full membership with 

the latter orchestra in 1989. In 1994 Robinson began arranging, composing, 

and publishing classical music for outreach ensembles of Detroit Symphony

musicians. Upon resigning from the Detroit Symphony Orchestra in 2012,

he expanded his work nationally, building new audiences for classical music

with his CutTime brand and passionate remarks.

18

2,964th Concert 

November 10, 2013

East Building Atrium

National Gallery ofArt New Music Ensemble

Steve Antosca, artistic director

William Brent, computer musician

Ross Karre, percussionist

Presented in honor of

Yes, No, Maybe: Artists Working at Crown Point Press

John Cage (1912-1992)

Cartridge Music (i960), performed as the Duetfor Cymbal alternative

Steve Antosca (b. 1955)

HABITAT (2013)

opening

piano as percussion

household

resonance

toolshed

triangles

closing

World Premiere Performance

This concert is sponsored in part by the

Randy Hostetler Living Room Music Fund.

!9
The Musicians

NATIONAL GALLERY OF ART NEW MUSIC ENSEMBLE

Formed in 2010 to present new music in the vibrant architectural environments ofthe National Gallery ofArt, the Gallery’s resident New Music

Ensemble has presented critically acclaimed concerts that feature strategic

placement ofmusicians throughout the spaces and utilize computer controlled transformations and spatialization ofsound. The group’s 2011 tribute

to the Gallery’s seventieth anniversary, staged in the West Building Rotunda,

was hailed by the Washington Post as “a spectacular, wonderfully provocative”

concert, which transformed the Rotunda into “an immense temple ofsound,

presenting a program oftheatrical new works that married humans with

computers, and ancient myths with contemporary aesthetics.”

STEVE ANTOSCA

Named artistic director ofthe National Gallery ofArt New Music Ensemble

in 2010, composer Steve Antosca began an additional appointment as composerin-residence at the Gallery on September 29 with the world premiere of my

end is my beginning, commissioned by Chamber Music America. The residency

culminates with this evening’s world premiere of his new work, habitat,

for percussion, video, and computers, composed especially for this performance

in the East Building Atrium. Antosca has received awards and commissions

for new works from the American Composers Forum, Argosy Foundation

Contemporary Music Fund, Bourges International Competitions, Fromm

Fund at Harvard University, Johansen International Competition, Kennedy

Center, Maryland State Arts Council, McKim Foundation at the Library of

Congress, Meet the Composer, and National Endowment for the Arts as well

as Chamber Music America. Recipient in 2011 ofthe National Academy of

Music’s International Music Prize for Excellence in Composition, Antosca

has a master’s degree in computer music composition from the Peabody 

Conservatory ofJohns Hopkins University. Formerly the artistic director of

verge ensemble, with which he performed at the National Gallery and at the

Corcoran Gallery ofArt, he was a codirector ofthe John Cage Centennial

Festival Washington, DC 2012.

20

WILLIAM BRENT

William Brent’s electroacoustic performance projects combine human- roboticand computer-realized sound, and are controlled by software written in the

Supercollider and Pure Data programming environments. In addition to

concert-based projects, Brent is also active in the areas ofremote network

music performance and interactive sound installation. His current research

areas are the relationship between gesture and sound in the performance of

live computer-based music, signal processing techniques for timbre identification, and musical instrument timbre perception. As a programmer, he has

developed various tools for use in Pure Data, including timbreiD, an open

source library of objects for real-time timbre analysis and identification; and

DiLib, a set of objects designed for the development ofnovel digital instruments. Using these packages, he has developed gesturally extended instrument systems, such as the gesturally extended piano and vibraphone, which

allow performers to control live audio processing, spatialization, and synthesis with arm movements incidental to conventional performance technique.

Brent is currently an assistant professor of audio technology at American

University in Washington, DC.

21
ROSS KARRE

A native of Battle Creek, Michigan, Ross Karre is a percussionist and temporal artist based in New York City. His primary focus is the combination of

media selected from classical percussion, electronics, theater, moving image,

visual art, and lighting design. After completing his doctorate in music at 

the University ofCalifornia San Diego with Steven Schick, Ross formalized

his intermedia studies with a master offine arts degree. He has worked

closely with composers from Asia, Australia, Europe, North America, and

South America, including Pierre Boulez, Helmut Lachenmann, and Harrison Birtwistle. Karre is a percussionist and director of production for the

International Contemporary Ensemble (ice) and performs regularly with

red fish blue fish, Third Coast Percussion (Chicago), the National Gallery of

Art New Music Ensemble, among many others. His projection design and

video art have been presented at the Gallery as well as in bbc Scotland’s

Glasgow Concert Halls, New York’s Park Avenue Armory and Miller Theater,

and BIMhuis in The Netherlands. The founder and owner of a growing

arts documentation business specializing in video and audio recordings of

performing arts (rKAD), Karre maintains a website at rosskarre.com.

22

Program Notes

Composed in i960, John Cage’s Cartridge Music is one ofthe earliest pieces

oflive electronic music. The word “cartridge” in the title refers to the cartridge

of a phonograph pick-up. In Cartridge Music, the performer is instructed to

insert an unspecified collection ofsmall objects into the cartridge such as

pipe cleaners, toothpicks, matches, Slinkys, piano wires, feathers, etc., which

are then amplified. Each performer manufactures his or her performance

part from given score materials that include a complex design ofpoints, open

and closed circles, biomorphic shapes, a “clock” circle, and a dotted curvy 

line written on sheets oftransparent plastic. Once completed, these materials

become symbols that indicate various sound-making paths including “loops”

(repeated activities) for the performer to follow. The resulting notation does

not represent sound to be made, but rather an action to be performed. The

activity and instrumentation result in an array ofsounds ranging from complex 

rhythms to simple scrapes, crackles, and hums. Volume and equalization

settings are also controlled by the performers, providing another layer of

sound modification. These actions generate an abundant variety ofmodified

sounds during a performance as well as a fascinating choreography of

physical motion.

In this evening’s performance, Karre and Brent realize Duetfor Cymbal,

an alternative version of Cartridge Music, by amplifying cymbals with conventional, contact, and underwater microphones. Their performance also 

incorporates digital technologies for further transforming and spatialization

ofthe resulting sounds. Brent designed custom audio processing software

for the performance in order to create relationships between the spatial positioning and transformation ofthese sounds as they are articulated in real-time.

The amplified sounds ofindividual instruments and electronic transformations

ofthose sounds shift throughout the space. Depending on when and where the

two elements overlap, subtle and dramatic blends ofsound treatment result.

Cage used Cartridge Music as a means to compose several ofhis lectures,

including “Where Are We Going? And What Are We Doing?” (i960); “On

Robert Rauschenberg, Artist, and His Work” (1961); and “Jasper Johns: Stories 

and Ideas” (1963). An insight into a later chapter in Cage’s incredibly creative

23
life can be obtained by visiting the exhibition Yes, No, Maybe: Artists Working

at Crown Point Press, on view on the ground floor ofthe West Building until

January 5, 2014. Visitors can spend time with Cage and some ofhis colleagues 

as they worked at Crown Point Press by viewing the documentary film John

Cage at Work, igy8-igg2, running continuously in the Project Room (adjacent 

to the West Building Lecture Hall Lobby) for the duration ofthe exhibition.

habitat for percussion, video and computer transformations is a concertlength technology venture with composition and concept by Steve Antosca, 

percussion performance and video content by Ross Karre, and audio technology by William Brent. The conceptual framework behind habitat involves a

percussionist who operates comfortably within the domain ofhis instruments,

emerging over the course ofhis performance into a larger, more profound

environment through the use ofhis skills as a performer and activator ofthe

technology. This involves his movement to and performance within a “spiral

galaxy” ofstations ofunique percussion instruments, distributed throughout

the performance space. As the percussionist moves through the space, a

multiplicity of effects—visual, auditory and architectural—enters into the

complex formula that comprises the habitat performance.

Stations include video elements that are triggered by the percussionist,

as well as video tracking as the percussionist moves through his various stations. The image content serves as a window, mirror, and lens/filter. Gestures

from the percussion performance are captured from a close perspective and

played back across monitors. Custom-designed video tracking software by

Brent will be used to follow the motions ofthe percussionist.

Used uniquely in tonight’s performance as one ofthe stations for the

percussionist, Harry Bertoia’s Tonal Sculpture (1977) is a gift to the National

Gallery’s permanent collection from Bernard and Audrey Berman. Consisting oflong rods ofberyllium copper tipped with bronze weights, the sculpture makes sounds as the weights brush against one another when activated 

by wind or air currents. Due to the fragility ofthe sculpture, the Gallery’s

curators have placed it indoors, where it is subject to the Gallery’s general

“Do not touch” rule and does not move. They have, however, especially and

only for this world premiere of HABITAT, approved that it should be “played”

by the performer.

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habitat stems from the tradition ofIntermedia art, in which a variety 

ofmedia are employed for the mutual benefit of underlying concepts. From

the outset ofthe compositional process, habitat treats percussion instruments, monitors, and projection surfaces as installed sculptures and unifying elements ofthe project.

To enhance the complex role of gesture, custom-designed video tracking

software follows the motions ofthe percussionist in performance and produces

information that alters the sights and sounds within the space. At times, arm

motions may be tied to drastic consequences—causing sounds to be thrown

across the hall, stretched, or shifted—and images to be distorted, saturated

or faded. In other contexts, such movements will be repurposed to initiate

more subtle shadings and transformations.

Analogous everyday gestures serve as a window into the performer’s

habitat. This catalog of gestures is abstracted to the point of ambiguous

textures via time remapping, image layering/compositing, flickering reorganization offrames, and numerous other filtration methods. In addition to

video, the tracking system features real-time audio analysis ofthe percussionist’s playing, allowing predetermined combinations of audiovisual

treatments to be cued in synchrony with specific instrumental timbres,

generating real-time processing and spatialization throughout the East

Building Atrium. The varying placement and instrumentation that define

the percussionist’s journey allow the audience to adjust its auditory perspective through spatialization cues and timbral shifts. Listeners are encouraged

to wander with the percussionist, as they would while experiencing gallery 

exhibits, constantly reformulating their perception ofthe performance.

Program notes on Cage are taken, in part,from the Website ofthe John Cage

Trust at johncage.org/pp/John-Cage-Works.cfm. Notes on habitat are basedon materials provided by Steve Antosca, William Brent, and Ross Karre.

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2,965th Concert

November 13, 2013

East Building Auditorium

Lea Gilmore and Classically Blue

“The Soul of a People: A celebration ofAfrican American

music traditions”

Presented in honor of

Tell It with Pride: The 54th Massachusetts Regiment and

Augustus Saint-Gaudens’ Shaw Memorial

The performers will announce the programfrom the stage

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The Musicians

LEA GILMORE

Named in 2005 by Essence magazine as one oftwenty-five “Women Shaping

the World,” Lea Gilmore is internationally respected and in demand as a

gospel, blues, jazz, and inspirational vocalist. She performs to sold-out

audiences in France, Germany, Great Britain, Italy, Luxembourg, Russia, 

Switzerland, The Netherlands, and the United States. A social activist who

has lent her voice to advocacy for the underserved around the world and in

her own backyard, she is known for her exquisite voice, bright smile, quick

wit, and infectious sense ofhumor. Gilmore is a winner ofthe W. C. Handy

“Keeping the Blues Alive” Award from the Blues Foundation for her historical work on the contributions ofwomen to the blues.

Gilmore was recently named as one ofthe first recipients ofthe James

Baldwin Medal for Civil Rights. A veteran offour terms on the Maryland

Advisory Board for the United States Commission on Civil Rights, she has

worked for reproductive justice for Native American women. A staunch and

vocal supporter for marriage equality and gay and lesbian rights, in 2011 she

was awarded the “Ally ofthe Year” award from Equality Maryland for her

dedication and work for the lgbtq communities. Selected by the United States

Embassy in Paris as a musical ambassador, she toured France, lecturing on

civil rights and performing at the Embassy and in concerts across the country.

Gilmore has been associated with the Damien Foundation in Brussels

for over fourteen years, and with her musical partner Marc Borms, leads

“Gospels for Damien” concerts across Belgium. Their efforts have raised

awareness to the plight ofvictims ofleprosy and tuberculosis in Africa, Asia,

and South America as well as critical funds for treatment ofthose diseases.

A native Baltimorean and a proud Marylander, Gilmore is the founder of

Baltimore Voices, a choral program for underserved middle school students

promoting self-empowerment through the vocal arts. Gilmore is currently

the Social Justice Fellow at the Robert W. Deutsch Foundation and director

ofnetwork coordination for the Moving Maryland Forward Network (mmfn).

She is also the cultural editor for the Marc Steiner Radio Show, which she

cohosts once a month.

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DERRICK THOMPSON

A native ofBuffalo, New York, music director ofClassically Blue and keyboard player Derrick Thompson received private instruction in piano and

violin throughout his elementary and high school years. After earning his 

bachelor of arts degree from Morehouse College, he moved to Baltimore as a

part ofthe Teach for America program. He taught third and fifth grades in 

the Baltimore City school system before becoming a music teacher in 2000.

He currently teaches part-time at the Mount Pleasant Christian School and

serves as director ofmusic at the Macedonia Baptist Church of Baltimore

City. A former student ofmaster pianists Stanley Cowell and Larry Willis,

Thompson is the cofounder ofthe jazz group Majestic Notes.

JESSE “JAY” MOODY, III

Drummer Jesse “Jay” Moody was born and raised in Baltimore, where he

began his formal music training in the city’s public school system at age

nine. While studying percussion and jazz performance at Towson University,

he performed with jazz and gospel ensembles. He has performed and

shared the stage with the Braxton Sisters, Jean Carne, Cyrus Chestnutt,

George Colligan, Lou Donaldson, Curtis Fuller, Greg Hatza, Freddie Jackson,

Jeff Majors, Maysa, Valerie Simpson, Gary Thomas, Frank Wess, and Larry

Willis. Moody has performed in the musicals Dreamgirls, The Wiz, The Billie

Holiday Story, Jelly’s Last Jam, and West Side Story, and appeared in the 1990

Barry Levinson film Avalon. He has performed in various venues such as

Blues Alley in Washington, DC, and the Anthology Jazz Club in San Diego.

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MITCHELL COATES

Based in Baltimore, bassist Mitchell Coates performs with various artists

and groups. After multiple recordings and performances over the last 

twenty-five years in Europe, Japan, and the United States, he has earned the 

respect of audiences and his fellow musicians. With a playing style filled

with warmth, originality, and excitement, Coates has shared the stage with 

such notable entertainers as Larry Bright, Steve Carrington, Dennis Chambers, Moe Daniels, Sheila Ford, Gabrielle Goodman, Greg Grainger, George

Gray, Tracy Hamlin, Greg Hatza, Tamm E. Hunt, Marcus Johnson, 

O’Donnell Levy, Gary Thomas, and Cavin Yarbrough. Coates is a frequent

guest at music festivals, including Artscape in Baltimore, Rehoboth Beach

Jazz Festival, and San Remo Jazz Festival in San Remo, Italy.

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2,966th Concert

November 17, 2013

West Building, West Garden Court

New Music Raleigh 

Timothy Myers, conductor

Ashleigh Semkiw, soprano

John Supko (b. 1980)

All Souls

World Premiere Performance

Text from the novel All Souls Day by Cees Nooteboom

English translation by Susan Massotty

Dramatis personae:

Arthur Daane (voice of Hans van Miegroet)

Elik Oranje (voice of Raquel Salvatella de Prada)

Male Narrator (voice of Bill Seaman)

Female Narrator (voice ofAshleigh Semkiw)

Arthur’s Boss (voice ofCees Nooteboom)

Arthur’s Friend (voice ofJohn Supko)

This concert is sponsored in part by the

Randy Hostetler Living Room Music Fund.

3°

Part 1: Arthur, a documentary filmmaker, wanders the frozen landscape

of nighttime Berlin in winter, pursued by memories ofhis dead wife

and son.

Part 2: Arthur and Elik, a young graduate student with a troubled past,

get acquainted in a Berlin cafeteria over coffee.

Part 3: Life-as-film, broken up into “a series ofimages.. .played, rewound,

stopped at random places...” Traumatic scenes from Elik’s childhood

are summoned.

Part 4: Arthur and Elik tell each other about their work. Arthur recalls

his experience documenting the atrocities in war-torn Belgrade.

Part 5: Arthur and Elik make love.

Part 5a: Sometime later, Elik comes to believe that she has been abandoned by Arthur.

Part 6: On her way to Spain, Elik is on a train to Hendayne, determined

to forget Arthur and start anew.

Part 6a: In Spain, where he has come to find Elik, Arthur is beaten and

mugged by skinheads.

Part 7: Knowing where to find Elik, Arthur travels by car in her direction. At the exit for the road that will take him to her, he changes his

mind and keeps driving into the Basque Country.

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The Musicians

NEW MUSIC RALEIGH

Founded in 2009, New Music Raleigh is the Southeast’s leading voice for 

the presentation of contemporary classical music. A collective of dynamic

musicians that presents cutting-edge new works and collaborations, New

Music Raleigh challenges the traditional perception of classical music

through carefully constructed programs and partnerships, by engaging and

inspiring diverse audiences, and giving voice to innovative and relevant

contemporary music. According to Raleigh’s News and Observer, the ensemble’s audiences experience “classical music you might call hip.”

Partnerships with emerging composers have included a live concert

version of Lost in the Trees’ album A Church that Fits Our Needs and the first

performance outside of New York City of Sarah Kirkland Snyder’s Penelope.

Led by curators Karen Strittmatter Galvin and Shawn Galvin, the ensemble

has created, produced, and performed unique events for Duke Performances,

the North Carolina Symphony, the Museum for Contemporary Art and

Design in Raleigh, and the North Carolina Opera.

TIMOTHY MYERS

With a diverse and adventurous repertoire ofsymphonic and ensemble works 

as well as more than sixty operas, conductor Timothy Myers is a young maestro

with his finger on the pulse oftoday’s musical world. His recent and upcoming engagements include debuts with the Atlanta, Chautauqua, Portland, and

Tulsa symphony orchestras, Fort Worth Opera, Houston Grand Opera, and

New Music Raleigh. In 2009 he was appointed by Lorin Maazel as the firstever associate conductor ofthe Castleton Festival. In 2012 Myers completed

a three-year term as principal guest conductor ofOpera Africa in Johannesburg,

where he conducted nearly thirty performances and assisted the company in

artistic development. As the artistic director and principal conductor of North

Carolina Opera, Myers has broadened the company’s repertoire to include

a variety ofworks ranging from Handel to Glass, and his productions ofthe

classic repertoire have garnered national and international acclaim.

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Myers has been engaged as assistant, associate, and cover conductor by

the London bbc Symphony, New York City Opera, and New York Philharmonic

orchestras, and is the principal guest conductor and artistic advisor ofthe

Palm Beach Symphony. Assistant conductor for two seasons ofthe American

Symphony Orchestra, he has also conducted the Brooklyn Philharmonic,

Jerusalem Symphony, and Johannesburg Philharmonic orchestras as well as

the opera companies ofAnchorage, Alaska; Asheville, North Carolina; and

Palm Beach, Florida.

ASHLEIGH SEMKIW

Born in Toronto, soprano Ashleigh Semkiw has spent the last ten years

performing in opera and recital at venues that include the Aspen Festival,

Berkeley CalPerformances, the Castleton Festival, Chicago Opera Theater,

Opera New Jersey, the Princeton Festival, and the Toronto Music Gallery. At

the Castleton Festival, she sang roles under the direction of Lorin Maazel in

Britten’s Albert Herring and The Rape ofLucretia. Other recent engagements

include Polly Peachum in Kurt Weill’s The Threepenny Opera, Cinderella in

Stephen Sondheim’s Into The Woods, and the role of Lolo (while also covering Valencienne) in The Merry Widow.

Semkiw’s oratorio credits include Handel’s Messiah, Schubert’s Mass in

G, and Messaien’s Visions ofthe Amen. A graduate ofNorthwestern University and the University ofToronto, she was also chosen to perform in 2009

at the Harman Center for the Arts’ Gala honoring Sir Ian McKellen.

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JOHN SUPKO

Currently the Hunt Family Assistant Professor of Music at Duke University,

John Supko was born in 1980 on Long Island, New York. He holds a bachelor’s degree from the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music and

master’s and doctoral degrees from Princeton University. A recipient of

Fulbright (2002) and Georges Lurcy (2007) fellowships, he studied at the 

Ecole Normale de Musique in Paris. He has won numerous prizes and 

grants, among them the bmi Student Composer Award, two ASCAP/Morton

Gould Young Composers Awards (including the 2008 Leo Kaplan Award),

the Grand Prize ofthe National Young Composers Competition, the Perkins 

Prize ofthe Princeton University Music Department, and a Commissioning

Music/usA Meet the Composer commission. His work has been published

in collaboration with poet Philippe Denis by Collection Memoires (Paris),

and has been released on New Amsterdam Records.

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Program Notes

All Souls by John Supko is a setting of nine excerpts from the novel All Souls

Day by the Dutch writer Cees Nooteboom (b. 1933) for soprano, chamber

orchestra, and electronic sampler. Falling somewhere between the categories

ofmelodrama, radio play, and opera, All Souls uses live and recorded voices

to bring to life the intense relationship ofArthur Daane, a widowed, middleaged documentary filmmaker, and Elik Oranje, a beautiful, mysterious woman 

halfhis age, whom he meets in Berlin in the winter in the late 1990s. The 

work opens with Arthur aimlessly wandering the freezing city at night, 

haunted by the ghosts ofhis wife and young son, who died in a plane crash.

Later, he meets Elik; they get to know each other, each attracted and 

frightened in equal measure by the trauma and sadness that mark both of

their stories. The broken, abusive home in Spain that Elik flees and the 

disturbing details ofArthur’s work documenting atrocities in Kosovo are

unflinchingly depicted in All Souls Day, as is a scene of passionate abandon. 

The physical intimacy and its attendant spiritual closeness prove ultimately 

unbearable for the two lovers, however, and they hasten to find separate 

escape routes— Elik back to Spain, where she is researching a little-known

medieval queen, and Arthur to various film assignments across the globe.

Near the end ofthe story, Arthur has a change of heart and resolves to go to

Spain to find Elik, but on the highway near the town where she is living he

makes a crucial decision. Rather than take the exit that will bring him to Elik,

he chooses to “turn away from the west and keep going until Basque names

began to appear on the traffic signs, and the broad skies ofthe north became 

visible beyond the foothills ofthe Pyrenees.”

Lasting a little over an hour, the music ofAll Souls is vivid and cinematic. 

The live ensemble, comprised of a string quintet, harp, two percussionists,

and two keyboardists, is augmented by recorded samples from a variety of

sources. A cafeteria in Berlin, a camel market in Morocco, and a highway in

Spain are just some ofthe sonic environments that lend the music an 

unusual visual character.

Program notes by Danielle Hahn, music program specialist, National Gallery ofArt

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