Preparing for Summer Strings

I've been hanging posters this week and proofreading press releases. Today I went to the church to play the piano. Rehearsals are scheduled and the players have their music. Here is the poster and press release. Please help spread the word. I hope to see you there.

-Ellen

Summer Strings: a String Orchestra Festival Featuring New Music

The sound of vibrating strings will fill Christ Episcopal Church on Sunday, August 6. The event is Summer Strings—a new music festival featuring a string orchestra and piano. The players are accomplished musicians from around the region. Four composers have written the music. Bozena O'Brien, violin, and Ellen Schwindt, piano, are soloists. This is an extravagant approach to Music as Meditation.

The music ranges from light-hearted to grand. Ken Turley, of Bridgton, Maine, wrote a suite for string orchestra called “Un Diner Leger” (A Light Dinner). Despite its levity you may just leave the concert humming its satisfying tunes. The last movement in the suite is called “A Confection” and deserves its sweet name.

Larry Wallach, who comes to Albany every year to lead early music week at World Fellowship Center, wrote a prelude and fugue for string orchestra. It looks backward in time with some early music styles of writing, but includes some delicious modern harmonies.

Ralph Farris, who appears occasionally at Christ Church when he is in town visiting his mother, wrote a piece called Three Mirrors that turns on harmonics and repeated patterns—as if the light between the mirrors might bounce back and forth forever.

Ellen Schwindt, organizer of the festival, wrote a double concerto for violin, piano, and string orchestra called “Music for a Resonant Space.” Bozena O'Brien will play the solo violin part, and Schwindt will play the solo piano part and lead the piece from the piano bench. The music depends on tones produced indirectly; not tones produced by the piano's hammers hitting strings, or by bows pulled across the violin's strings, but by sympathetic vibrations from the interactions of directly produced tones. The performance at Christ Church will be the world premiere of the piece. A Pastorale and Allegro for strings by Schwindt rounds out the program. This piece speaks to minimalist forms while maintaining a driving rhythm throughout.

The festival runs from August 4 to August 6 and includes a potluck picnic for listeners and players on Saturday, August 5, at noon. To participate in the picnic, R.S.V.P. to Ellen at ellen.m.schwindt@gmail.com. Summer Strings is part of the Music as Meditation series hosted by Christ Church and led by Ellen Schwindt. The concert is free, but attenders may make donations for the extra costs incurred by the festival, either on my blog or after the concert.