VALERIE COLEMAN: Four Bostonian Scenes (2022)
Commissioned by Celebrity Series of Boston for Neighborhood Arts for their 2022 Solo(s) Together commissioning project program, this five-movement collection of four flute solos takes the listeners on a journey through Boston’s most iconic scenes and old haunts of the composer during her studies in Boston. The work is influenced by the paintings of Boston-based African American artist, Allan Rohan Crite. His works, "Tire Jumping in Front of My Window," " Cambridge, Sunday Morning," and others depicting the African American experience in Boston were used as inspiration.
TIMOTHY MCCORMACK: “heavy in air” (2020)
In this duo for alto flute and cello, nearly every gesture is modeled after the act of breathing, with one instrument inhaling and the other answering it in exhale. The instruments are at nearly every measure acting as a unit, shaping different parts of the musical phrase jointly in response to each other. Throughout the piece, pitch material is veiled behind greater or lesser fields of white noise produced largely by breathy multiphonic dyads in the flute and natural harmonics in the cello. I approached this piece as a tender and vulnerable celebration of collaborative music making: each delicate sound to be cared for, and each musical phrase is a joint utterance.
—Timothy McCormack, composer
TALIA ERDAL: “Ballade for the Death of a Dove” (2019)
This piece is dedicated to the memory of my mother, Yona Erdal (1950–2016), whose name in Hebrew means "dove." The composition is a lament-memory consisting of Jewish and Middle Eastern sounding motives, echoing the songs and melodies that my mother used to sing to me, to herself, and around the shabbat table. I hope she would have enjoyed it.
—Talia Erdal, composer
VALERIE COLEMAN: “Ruby Street NOLA” (2013)
“Ruby Street Nola” is a homage to the bon temps of New Orleans nightlife.
WILLIAM GRANT STILL: “Mother and Child” (1943)
“Mother and Child” by William Grant Still (1895–1978) was inspired by Sargent Johnson's painting and was originally a movement from his 1943 Suite for Violin and Piano, later expanded by the composer to a version for string orchestra. This version arranged by Alexa Still explores the entire range of the flute employing its singing qualities and is stylistically reminiscent of both spirituals and Debussy.
EVAN WILLIAMS: “Hindewhu” (2021)
“Hindewhu,” pronounced hin-du-hu, is inspired by the musical technique of the same name created by the African Pygmies. The technique employs a bamboo whistle which is only capable of producing a single pitch. The performer supplements this pitch by singing other notes with their own voice. The hocket technique from the whistle and voice combines into one musical line. In the same manner, this work calls on the piccolo player to combine their own voice with the sound of the instrument to create complex musical lines.
KARIM AL-ZAND: Ignoble Dances (2020)
Written in 2020, Ignoble Dances reflects upon that disconsolate year. The seven short dances draw musical influence from a variety of sources. The title of the first movement, “Antemasque,” refers to a “buffoonish dance” that precedes a masque, a courtly entertainment of the 16th century. Of course, the word has gained another meaning in 2020, one that is equally buffoonish. Here the flute plays an urgent tune over an obstinate bass (ostinato). “Dance of Duplicity” presents a wistful slow drag (a ragtime two-step) gradually undermined by repeated interruptions. “Dance of Denial” is based on the Italian tarantella, in which those bitten by the tarantula spider dance in a feverish trance until they collapse. “Distanced Dance” is a melancholy solo for flute alone. In “J. B. Dances a Jig in the Gloom,” a surprisingly cheerful flute tune emerges from the piano’s somber haze. “Dog Whistle Dance” features the piccolo and the highest register of the interplay. The set concludes with a pavan: a slow, stately Renaissance dance. In 1648, composer Thomas Tomkins wrote a lament in memory of King Charles I, entitled “Sad Pavan for These Distracted Tymes." In my pavan, which draws on that of Tomkins, it is the music that is distracted and the times that are sad.
—Karim Al-Zand, composer