Word: corigliano
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...most anticipated concerts this season, the Boston Symphony Orchestra delivered an astonishing world premiere of John Corigliano's Symphony no. 2. Corigliano's first symphony, written as a response to the AIDS crisis in 1989, hit the musical world with such force that it has become one of the most often performed orchestral works of our time. His second, although completely different in both instrumentation and subject matter, deserves that same success...
...minute symphony for string orchestra is a reworking of Corigliano's String Quartet of 1996. In five movements, its "arch-form" is influenced by Bartok's fourth quartet, in which pairs of movements (one and five, two and four) are related, while the middle movement "night music" stands on its own. Furthermore, as Corigliano wrote in the program notes, "the symphony is based upon a motto composed of even repetitions of a single tone, and a sequence of disjunct minor thirds. There are also four pitch centers recurring throughout the work: C, C-sharp, G and G-sharp." These elements...
From the almost inaudible opening whispers of strings with practice mutes attached, I was immediately drawn into this detailed and contrapuntally sophisticated work. Transforming a work for string quartet into string orchestra is no easy task, but Corigliano solved the problems through effective orchestration techniques. This is especially true in the second movement scherzo, which features tutti chords interrupted by outbursts from a string quartet within the orchestra. Corigliano takes advantage of full string sections to provide a more dense and elaborate solution to aleatoric passages. Having double basses with low C-string extensions also adds a richer, fuller sound...
Perhaps the best example of the brilliance of the orchestration was in the third movement nocturne, in which Corigliano attempted to recreate the sound he heard during a stay in Morocco, when the calls of muezzins from different mosques collided and "created a glorious counterpoint." In the symphony, beautiful dovetailing lines shimmer and seem to echo off each other, something unattainable in the quartet version. A wild fugue using different tempos for each statement of the subject (but notated in the same meter for all instruments) leads into the postlude, where repetitions of the minor third interval perhaps intentionally recall...
...child prodigy and a victim of the Chinese Cultural Revolution. These stories, alas, are utterly predictable. Still, Samuel L. Jackson breaks through the crust of cliches as an expert called in to verify the instrument's provenance, and violinist Joshua Bell plays and Esa-Pekka Salonen conducts John Corigliano's score ravishingly...