flealing Modes
Brooklyn Rider String Quartet
Johnny Gandelsman, violin
Colin Jacobsen, violin
Nicholas Cords, viola
Michael Nicolas, cello

Guest Artist Series
KaainConcert Hall I November 2,2018 | 7:30 pm

Program
Schismq

Caroline Shaw (b. 1982)

Kanto Kechua #2

Gabriela Lena Frank (b.1972)

Zeher (Poison)

Reena Esmail (b. 1983)

World Premiere
borderlands

Matana Roberts (b.

197 5)

World Premiere
Intermission

QuartetNo. 15 inAminoq Op. 132
Assai sostenuto - Allegro
Allegro ma non tanto
Adagio molto - Andante
Alla Marcia, assai vivace - Pii allegro - Presto
Allegro appassionato

Lndwig van Beetho ven (17 7 0 -1827)

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Schismu

Caroline Shaw
Schisma is a reference to the phrase "in the cleft of the rock," which appears in many scriptures
including *te Song of Solomon and Isaiah.In the Book of Exodus (33.22} there is a beautiful line
which reads: "I will put you in a cleft of the roc\ and I will cover you with my hand until I have
passed by." It is essentially a promise of safety, of a rnakeshift refuge within a crack in
sornething as hard and unforgiving as mountain rock, until the danger has passed. It is a kind of
nest, a home. I have always felt that Beethoven's Heiliger Dankgesang (third rnovement of Opus
132) uses a nestlike architecture in a unique and profound way. The return of the dance-like
Neue Kraft ftihlend section always feels like a warm homecoming, a place of hope and shelter
and deep comfort. The choice to title this piece with the modern Greek word schisma (a
translation of the Hebrew n'li7l, or "cleft") is a reference to the islands in today's Greece which
have become harsh refugee camps for Syrians seeking asylum from the war. It also points to the
nature of war, of the break between peoples, and of the search for hope and new growth within
the breaks and crevices.
Shaw

-Caroline

Schisma commissioned for Brooklyn Rider by Madeline Island Chamber Music in honor
Caroline Marshall.
First perforfiiance, June 29, 201B - Madeline Island, Wisconsin

of

Kanto Kechua #2
Gabriela Lena Frank
In my early thirties, after receiving a devastating diagnosis of a life-threatening autoimmune
disease, I paradoxically entered the most uniquely creative period of my life. Looking bac\ I
believe I might have been grasping at what was most life-affirming to me, terrified of impending
surgeries, radiation, drugs, and pain. Over several months, I composed hours of chamber music,
wrote bilingual poetry and a fantasy novel of time-travel back to my ancestral homeland of preConquest Peru, knitted and sewed, mastered the tarot and intricate origami, dove into the
alchemy of homemade soaps and face sreams, interned in bee-keeping, cultivated sourdoughs,
and learned to make cheese.

This was quite the prelude, bright and desperate both, to several years of treatment when most of
my creative endeavors were muted. Now, a number of years later, scarred but healthy and
working actively as a composer, I still carry around rnelodies born from that tirne; and in20l7 ,
fashioned a quartet from this oddly luminescent wellspring into the first movement of
lYalkabout: Concerto Jbr Orchestra, somewhat simplified for its symphonic weight. When I was
approached by the brilliant string quartet Brooklyn Rider for a work on the theme of healing, I
found my chance to hear these ideas for the nimbler string quartet, my original conception. The
result is Kanto Kechua #2 ("Quechua Song" with Quechua being the dominant language ofpostinca Peru) now with all of its ornamental intricacies and string-crossing whirls under an achingly
high if brief violin line. Throughout, motifs from native Andean folk music proliferate.

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Quartet No. 15 in A minor, Op. 132
Ludwig van Beethoven
And it came to pass, when the evil spirit from God was upon Saul, that David took an harp, and
played with his hand; so Saul. was refresked and was well, and the evil spirit departedfrom him.
- (I Samuel 16.23)
The power of music to heal body, mind and spirit was a belief held from the ancient Greeks up
through the ages. The topic is just as relevant today, where the synergy between music and
healing is being passionately explored in the field of modern brain science (with some

astounding {indings). Whether the music itself is directly restorative or if it sewes as a powerful
and guiding metaphor has been long debated, but nevertheless, Beethoven's inherent belief in
music's healing power is well illustrated by a visit he paid in 1804 to his forrner student, pianist
Dorothea von Ertmann, following the death of her three-year-old son. O{fering music, he
prefaced an hour*long improvisation with the sparsely chosen words: "We will now speak to
each other in tones." Beethoven's intimate friend Antonie Brentano also recalled that "...he
visited me often, almost daily, and then he plays spontaneously because he has an urgent need to
alleviate suffering, and he feels he is able to do so with his heavenly sounds..." The Quartet in A
minor, Opus 132 is the second in a series of f,rve quarlets written at the request the Russian
Prince Galitzin. These so-called late quartets represent an exquisite cuhnination of Beethoven's
output as a composer. Evidence of the deaf composer's own suffering and search for higher
meaning is found scattered throughout his notebooks during his final years and Opus 132
powerfully ernbodies the musical essence of late Beethoven; an autobiographical world that
wrestles with questions surrounding life, death, and spirituality.

A harbinger of music to come, an almost obsessive drive towards overarching motivic and
thematic unity permeates this quartet. A pair of semitones separated by an expressive leap is
inkoduced in the opening bars of the first movement, these tones (in a great multitude of pitch
values, inversions, and durations) serving as fodder for all that follows across the five-movement
structure. Even with the sweetness of the memorable second theme, the opening movement is
generally characterized by a brooding and highly combustible tendency- In contrast, Beethoven
often relied on pastoral settings across his output to explore a sense of repose and spiritual
renewal, here reflected in the amiable second movement. Flowing over a gentle topography, the
material is still infonned here by the general motif, though with stormy tendencies much
subdued. Notable is the hurdy-gurdy trio section on an A drone, filling the listener with the
restorative powers of the fresh airIn the early spring of 1825, Beethoven found hirnself in the throes of an infected bowel-far
more serious an affliction in the day-pausing his ability 1o continue work on the quartet. This
episode is reflected in the sublime center of this five-movement quar-tet, the Heiliger
Dankgesang eines Genesesen an die Gottheit, in der lidischen Tonart (Song of Thanksgiving
from a Convalescent to the Deity, in the Lydian Mode). Beethoven at this time in his life often

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I'm exceedingly grateflil to be able to, at long last, bring this music to life as I step now in
wellness and creative abundance.
Lena Frank

-Gabriela

Kanto Kechua #2 commissioned by the Vail Dance Festival, Darnian Woetzel, Artistic Director,
for Brooklyn Rider and Ballet Hispdncio, choreographed by Claudia Schreier.
First performance, August 6, 2018 - Vail, Colorado

Zelrcr (Poisort)
Reena Esmail
In September 2018, I developed an infection in my throat that wouldn't subside. For two weeks,
it became increasingly difficult to swallow, to breathe and especially to speak. During this time
of intense, painful silence, I thought about what this loss of voice represented for me. Of how
many times in my life I had been rendered voiceless-either by others or by my own doing.
Healing, in this case, was not about enduring the pain, but about releasing the poison I have
always srvallowed-that didn't belong to me. It was only when I felt myself begin to release that
poisonous energy that I felt the physical infection begin to subside.
This piece was conceived during those dark weeks, and is simply about that release. It uses two
incredibly beautiful Hindustani raags: the dark and mysterious Todi and the mournful
Bhirnpalas. While working on this piece, I was also working on a selting of a beautifulHafz
poem which ends "When the violin can forgive I every hurt caused by others 1 the heart starts
singing." That is very much the spirit of this piece, too.
Zeher (Poison) generously commissioned for Brookll,n Rider by Judy Evnin. This evening's
performance is the World Premiere.

borderlands...
tVlantana Roberts
borderlands... is built around historical data about the US-Mexico border crisis and the problems
that have ensued with the more recent archaic American immigration policies. I decided to focus
on a type healing that is about healing cultural rifts, healing ideas of difference, healing through
remembering history, healing by highlighting the protection of rights that should be afforded to
every human, regardless of where they may come from. This used to be in the spirit of what it
means to be American (to me). What is going on right now is not American. It's a sham and a
sharne- We can do better....
Roberts

-Matana

borderlands... commissioned for Brookllu Rider by The Visiting Qua(et Residency Program at
Arizona State University- This evening's performance is the World Premiere.

ffiil fffii{ifl'fifr'theArrs
Arizona State University

looked back in the musical tradition for inspiration and as a \,vay to imagine the future.
Borrowing from the ancient church modes with his use of the Lydian scale (F major with a raised
4th scale degree), Beethoven's choice was most certainly not random; sixteenth cenfury Italian
theorist Gioseffe Zarlino observed that "the Lydian rnode is a rernedy for fatigue of the soul, and
similarly for that of the body." Three serene and prayerful Lydian chorale prelude episodes, each
occurrence increasingly intermingling the pure tones of the half note chorale with embellished
prelude material, gradually create a sense of heavenly ascension across the movement.
Modulating with the simple hinge of a C-sharp, two D major sections (Neue Kraft ftihlencl)break
these reveries with joyous expressions of new strength and convalescence. My beloved chamber
music coach while in school, Felix Galamir (then approaching 90) vividly demonstrated this by
stepping from his chair one leg at a time and standing tall. In his case, he was not much taller
standing than seated, but the point was nevertheless well received! But the Heiliger Dankgesang
is not only a celebration offeeling new physical strength, but it is essentially an expression on
the renewal of the soul- For Beethoverl the return of his physical health likely ran of secondary
importance to a return of his creative poweff. Touchingly written in the margin of a sketch for
this movement is a note surely not meant for his doctor: "Thank you for giving me back the
strength to enjoy life."
Beethoven seems to scorn those of us rnoved to tears by the sublirne conclusion of the third
movement with the interjection a raucous march, bringing us back to earth with bold force. This
very brief movernent leads into a heroic violin recitativo recalling the choral finale of his ninth
syrnphony (Op 125), catapulting us into the highly turbulent world of the finale. Searching in
various guises for resolution arnidst strains found across all of the preceding rnovernents, the
virtuosic writing shows Beethoven very much writing for the future; how foreign the
interlocking rhythms and gnarly contrapuntal figurations must have felt at the time (they still
do)! And at the end of this monumental musical journey, one which invites the listener to
confront and transcend his/her own fragilities, the music is drawn to conclusion with an
effervescent coda, almost Mozart-like in its exuberance. Here is Beethoven once again playing
with our emotions; it's either a joyful summation of our human ability to rise above life's
challenges or a rebuke for taking ourselves too seriously. Or perhaps both?

-Nicholas

Cords

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