Word: harbisons
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...Reported by Hannah Bloch/Washington, Georgia Harbison and William Tynan/New York and Jeffrey Ressner/Los Angeles
...main event of the evening was the premiere of a new saxophone sonata by Harbison, performed by Ian Carroll '97, with Professor of Mathematics Noam Elkies. The sonata, titled "San Antonio," was the most attractive of the three works performed, incorporating Latin dance rhythms and some of the jazz effects usually associated with the saxophone; as Harbison's program notes indicate, the three-movement work recalls an actual dance party upon which the composer stumbled while in San Antonio...
...Harbison's music, for all its concessions to tonality and sentimental program notes, is not calculated to win friends and influence people. That fact was evident in the mechanics of the sonata's premiere; it was-commissioned by a new World-Wide Concurrent Premieres and Commissioning Fund to which saxophonists around the world pay a fee for the right to premiere the work in their local area. Thus the work, which was performed Sunday night in dozens of cities, is guaranteed at least fifty performances; the idea is to avoid the fate of most commissions, which are performed once...
...creatures of the academy and the foundation. It is possible that it has always been so, that foundations have simply replaced the nobility as sources of patronage. Still, one has the feeling that a hundred years from now, nobody will build a concert hall and put the names of Harbison, Adams and Cage on the frieze...
Given the difficulty of the music, the performances on Sunday night were all the more impressive. The Cantabrigian String Quartet, composed of Harvard students Akiko Tarumoto '98, Rebecca Baumann '98, Philip Kim '98, and Ellis Verosub '98, gave a clear, intelligent rendition of Harbison's quartet. In the Chorale Cantata, which concluded the evening, soprano Awet Andemicael '96 displayed her usual lovely tone and crisp diction. She was accompanied by an ensemble composed of Salley Koo '97 and Stephanie Misono '98, violins; Peter Kim '96, viola; Raman Ramakrishnan '98, cello; and Andrew Cowan '96, bass. Oboist Daniel...