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Die Dämmerungen by David Felder
Track List
I. Dämmerungen
II. East of Aurora
III. De profundis clamavi…
IV. Götzen-Dämmerung
Notes
Boston Modern Orchestra Project, Gil Rose
From the composer’s website:
Die Dämmerungen was commissioned by and composed for the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra and JoAnn Falletta in the period of late 2017 – early 2019. The work is in four movements, each a musical musing upon varieties of twilights, referencing daybreak as well as sunset, the processes of aging as experienced individually, and within societies as cycles of time inexorably turn. For each movement, poetic inscriptions along with the movement titles, serve to frame the music.
The movements are:
I. Die Dämmerungen, with part 1 subtitled Morgendammerung and part 2 subtitled Abenddammerung and an inscription from poet William Carlos Williams: (reprinted by permission)
Sparkles from the Wheel
The descent beckons
As the ascent beckoned.
Memory is a kindb
Of accomplishment.
A sort of renewal
Even
An initiation, since the spaces it opens are new places
Inhabited by hordes
Heretofore unrealized,…
”The Descent” By William Carlos Williams, from THE COLLECTED POEMS: VOLUME II, 1939-1962,
copyright ©1948,1962 by William Carlos Williams. Reprinted by permission of New Directions Publishing Corp.
II. East of Aurora, the goddess of dawn and a sense of personal, rather than collective, place…with an inscription from contemporary American poet Dana Gioia (reprinted by permission)
“The Burning Ladder”
Dana Gioia
Jacob
never climbed the ladder
burning in his dream. Sleep
pressed him like a stone
in the dust,
and when
he should have risen
like a flame to join
that choir, he was sick
of travelling,
and closed
his eyes to the Seraphim
ascending, unconscious
of the impossible distances
between their steps,
missed
them mount the brilliant
ladder, slowly disappearing
into the scattered light
between the stars,
slept
through it all, a stone
upon a stone pillow,
shivering. Gravity
always greater than desire.
III. De Profundis clamavi… Psalm 130, a song of ascents… From the depths I call to thee… a prayer from moments near to the abyss…
IV. Götzen-Dämmerung, a direct reference to Nietzsche’s Twilight of the Idols, somehow directly relevant (again?) in an age of shrill, incessantly repetitive propaganda…
The work is approximately 24 minutes long, and in movement three calls for the inclusion of low instruments contrabass clarinet, and contrabass trombone, emphasizing the darker colors possible within the orchestral palette, as appropriated to the subject matter directly at hand in III.
Die Dämmerungen was recorded March 15, 2022 at Mechanics Hall in Worchester, Massachusetts.
Published by Theodore Presser, Inc.
Personnel
Flute
Ashley Addington *
Jessica Lizak (piccolo)
Dianne Spoto (alto flute)
Oboe
Nancy Dimock
Laura Pardee-Schaefer (English horn)
Jennifer Slowik *
Clarinet
Amy Advocat (bass clarinet, contrabass clarinet)
Gary Gorczyca
Jan Halloran *
Bassoon
Jensen Ling *
Hazel Malcolmson
Gregory Newton (contrabassoon)
Horn
Nicholas Auer
Alyssa Daly
Neil Godwin
Kevin Owen *
Trumpet
Eric Berlin
Terry Everson *
Richard Kelley
Trombone
Hans Bohn *
Alexei Doohovskoy
Bass Trombone
Angel Subero (contrabass trombone)
Tuba
Kenneth Amis
Timpani
Craig McNutt
Percussion
Jonathan Hess
Robert Schulz *
Nicholas Tolle
Piano
Yoko Hagino (celeste)
Harp
Ida Zdorovetchi
Violin I
Piotr Buczek
Benjamin Carson
Gabriela Díaz *
Tudor Dornescu
Susan Jensen
Jae Cosmos Lee
Nicole Parks
Amy Sims
Katherine Winterstein
Jonah Zur
Violin II
Colleen Brannen *
Paola Andrea Caballero
Julia Cash
Rose Drucker
Lilit Hartunian
EmmaLee Holmes-Hicks
Aleksandra Labinska
Sean Larkin
Mina Lavcheva
Edward Wu
Viola
Jason Fisher
Noriko Futagami
Amelia Hollander Ames
Samuel Kelder
Emily Rome
Peter Sulski *
Alexander Vavilov
Noralee Walker
Cello
Miriam Bolkosky
Ariana Falk
Ming-Hui Lin
Valléda Miragias
David Russell *
Benjamin Swartz
Bass
Anthony D’Amico *
John DeMartino
Kate Foss
Michael Hartery
Bebo Shiu
Peter Walsh
Joel Gordon, Recording Engineer and Brad Michel, Dolby Atmos Engineer
