Garsh"DThe National Orchestral Composition Discovery Network

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c/o American Composers Orchestra

24q W. 35 St., Suite 405

New York, NY 10001

212-977-8495fax: 212-977-8995

www. americancom posrs.org

Garsh"DMemphis Symphony

New Music Readings

David Loebel, Conductor

Michael Gandolfi & Melinda Wagner, Mentor Composers

Wednesday & Thursday, May 21 &22,2009Clark Opera Memphis Center

6745 Wolf River ParkwayMemphis, TN

illlemohis SvmphonvNew tr\rlusicRe'adin$s

Board and Administration

Wednesday, M ay 20,20097:30 -'10:00P\lll; Session I

CHRISTIAN BALDINI elapstng twilighf shades

PATRICIO DA SILVA Three Pteces for Orchestra

Thursday, May 21,2009'l:30 - A:AhPfrll.; Session ll

JEAN AHN Sa/f

ANDREIA PINTO-CORREIA Acanto

EarShot is made possrb/e with the support of the Andrew W, A/lellon Foundation

and the Aaron Copland Fund for lrlusic.

Executive ComrnitteeDan Poag, Chairman

Ryan Fleur, President and CEOGerald Wade, SecretaryPaul Rogers, TreaswerFrank Wilson, atLargeSandra Burke, atLargeScott Moore, Orchestra Representative

Members of the tsoardMichael BararPaul BertDr. I(aren BowyerSandra BurkeCecil GodmanSteve GuinnLarry HardyScott HeppelMary Ann HodgesRandy HoltBuzzy HusseyDon HutsonFlorence LeffierGordin McMurfryMabel McNeillBob MednikowDr. Lisa MendelDavid MillerGloria NoblesRandy PattonDan Poag, ChairmanRobert QuirutPaul RogersJeff SanfordAllison SmithBridget TrenaryMichael UiberallChantal VeevaeteWade WatsonAlonzo WeaverJeff WeintraubRuby WhartonSteve White

AdministrationRyan Fleur, President & CEO

Rhonda Causie, Grants ManagerJenny Compton, Head Librarian and

Education Manager

Amy Clithero Gill, Director of ArtisticOperations & Community Engagement

Shelby Hue Terry, VP of Development

Lisa Dixon, Chief Operating OfficerI(eva Duckett, Marketing Manager

Anthony Plummer, PR DirectorShelby Johnson, Stage Manager

Diane LaCroix, Business Manager Assistant

Anita Redden, Chief Financial OfficerMarti Laslavic, Dirqctor of Development

Nicole Ward, Marketing Assistant

Doug Mayes, Orchestra Personnel Manager

James Richens, Resident Composer

Orchestra Roster

Violin I

Susanna Perry Gilmore

Paul TurnbowMarisa Polesky

Barrie CooperWen-Yih You

Jessica Munson

Violin llChristine Palmer

Gaylon PattersonNeal ShafferHeather TrussellLenore Mclntyre

ViolaJennifer PuckettMarshall Fine

lrene WadeKaren Casey

CelloRuth Valente Burgess

lren ZomborMilena Albrecht

BassScott BestChris Butler

FluteKaren BuslerTodd Skitch

Jenny Compton

OboeJoseph SalvalaggioSaundra D'Amato

ClarinetJames Gholson

Rena FellerNobuko lgarashi

BassoonJennifer Rhodes

Michael Scott

French HornSamuel Cornpton

lon Balu

Caroline KinseyDan Vidican

TrumpetScott Moore

Susan Enger

TromboneGreg Luscombe

Mark Vail

TubaCharles Schulz

TimpaniFrank Shaffer

PercussionMichaelKarczJames Baird

PianoAdrienne Park

LibrarianJenny Compton

Personnel ManagerDouglas Mayes

Composer ParticipantsJean Ahn: Salt

Born in l(orea in 197 6, Jean Ahn began studying piano and

composition at avery early age. She finished her B.A. and M.M. at

Seoul National University under professor Baek Byoung Dong and

received a Ph.D. in-2008 from UC Berkel.y, where her teachers

included Edmund Campion, Cindy Cox, David Wessel, Jorge

Liederman, and Richard Felciano. Her creative output includes works

ranging from solo instruments to full orchesff&, as well as choral, dance,

and electroacoustic music. She is currently a Lecturer atUC Berkeley

and lives in the Bay Area with her husband and two young children.

Salt was premiered by the UC Berkeley's University Symphory, under

the baton of David Milnes in May 2008. The composer says of the

piece, "Salt began its life in 2005, when I found myself driven by a

chord of six notes.... In short, I experimented with all the possibilities

opened up by this one chord. The idea of transfonning a single chord

without losing its ftrndamentals, combined with the sparkling image ofthe ofiraments, reminded me of the properties of salt. Thus was born the

title of the composition. Just as salt preserves its taste no matter what itis mixed with, the essence of the original chord of the piece is not lost

throughout the entire work. In order to enhance the metaphor, the

electronics used in the piece-built on the resonance model of the mainchord with spectral transformation-employ the actual sound ofdropping, spreading and touching salt. Finally, the title Salt also reflects

my Christian faith and my musing on the words 'Ye are the salt of the

earth.' Thus the piece has the touch, taste and also the meaning of salt."

Christian Baldini: elapsing twilight shades

Christian Baldini, born in 1 g78,is currently the Music Director and

Conductor of the Symphony Orchesta at the State Universtty of NewYork at Buffalo. He regularly guest conducts in South America,England (Aldeburgh Festival) and the USA. Most recently he was

invited by Leonard Slatkin to conduct the National Symphony

Orchestra (Washington, DC). This summer he will be conducting the

Royal Scottish National Orchestra working with Marlyn Brabbins and

will be a featured composer and conductor in Edenkoben (Germany). In

the Fall 2009, Christian will begin his appointment as the director oforchestras at the University of California at Davis.

As Baldini describes his work, "elapsing twilight shades reflects myparticular interest in creating sonic structures that behave in a quasi

cubist fashion. In fact, listening to the piece is a bit like looking at an

abstract painting. One idea is presented from several differentperspectives. The 'space' around the idea is manipulated, folded, and

viewed as if through a kaleidoscopo, repeated by many different lenses.

This is the starting point for a work that gradually becomes inflected by

a few humorous moments and a delight in symphonic tradition. There

are two main critical arrivals in the piece, where the previous music is

expanded into a more rhapsodic and quite different dimension. For me

these moments represent a special ideal of collective beauff, achieved

only through hope and freedom."

Patricio da Silva: Three Pieces.for Orchestra

Patricio da Silva (b. 1973) received formal musicaltraining at the

Escola Superior de Mirsica de Lisboa, where he studied piano withJorge Moyano and composition with Ant6nio Pinho Vargas (8.M. inpiano, 1995). He flren pursued his composition studies in the US, firstas a recipient of the Betfy Freeman Foundation Scholarship inComposition with Morton Subotnick, Stephen L. Mosko, ffid MelPowell Xthe California Institute of the Arts G/mA, L999), and lrtet,with support from the Fundageo Luso-Americanapara o

Desenvolvimento (Portugal), he completed the Ph.D. program incomposition at the Universlty of California (2003), having studied

composition with William Kraft, computer music with Curtis Roads,

and algorithmic composition and music with Artificial Intelligence withDavid Cope.

Further studies include work with Michael Gandolfi, John Harbisotr,

Sydney Hodkinson, Augusta Read Thomas, Bernard Rands, HelmutLachenman, and Karlheinz Stockhausen. His post-doctoral work as

invited researcher at IRCAM in France was followed in the UK by aresearch grant for computer music by the Portuguese Foundation ofScience and Technolory. Awards include the Intemational Barto Prize,the Gould Family Foundation Composers Award, the Ojai FestivalMusic for Tomorrow, the Otto Eckstein Family Fellowship, the Susan

and Ford Schumann Fellowship, and residencies at the MacDowellColony and the Atlantic Center for the Arts. His music has been

recently heard at Tanglewood, Ojai Music Festival, Aspen, RuhrFestival, Schleswig Holstein Music Festival, Historische Stadthalle

Wupp ertal, Bayer Erholungshaus, London Festival of American Music,

Prior to joining the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra, David Loebelserved as Assistant and then Associate Conductor of the CincinnatiSymphony Orchestra. A native of Cleveland, he is a graduate ofNorthwestern Universrff, which in 2000 honored him with an AlumniMerit Award.

Memphis Symphony OrchestraThe Memphis Symphony Orchestra was organized in 1952 and is wellestablished as the Mid South's largest performing arts organization TheMSO presents a 39-week season of Masterworks, Pops, and Chamber

subscription concerts. Historic collaborations with other arts agencies

and organizations allow the MSO to serve diverse regional audiences.

Having received numerous ASCAP awards for advenfurousprogramming, MSO's mission is to create meaningful experiencesthrough music, and its vision is to artistically engage. MSO artists are

vital members of the Memphis community, providittg rich musicalexperiences for all ages.

About EarShotThe Memphis Symphony New Music Readings are apart of EarShot,

the newly formed National Orchestral Composition Discovery Networkthat initiates partnerships with orchestras around the country; provides

consulting, productior, and administrative support for orchestras toundertake readings, residencies, performances, and composer-

development programs; identifies promising orchestral composers,

increasing awareness and access to their music; supports orchestras'

commitment to today' s composers and enhances national visibilrty fortheir new music programs.

EarShot is coordinated by American Composers Orchestra incollaboration with American Composers F'orum, American MusicCenter, the League of American Orchestras, and Meet The Composer. Itbrings together the artistic, administrative, marketing, and productionresources and experience of the nation's leadirg organizations devoted

to the support of new American orchestral music.

Orchestra, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, San Francisco SymphonyOrchestra, National Symphony Orchestra, Minnesota Orchestra, SaintPaul Chamber Orchestra, Seattle Symphony Orchestra, and BrooklynPhilharmonic Orchestra. He has also conducted the symphonyorchestras of Baltimore, Indianapolis, Milwaukee, New Jersey, and

Syracuse, the North Carolina Symphony, the Buffalo PhilharmonicOrchestra, the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, the I(ansas CitySymphory, the Louisville Orchestra, Symphony Silicon Valley, theLoui s iana Philharmonic Orche stra and the Calgary Philharmonic,among many others.

Internationally, Maestro Loebel made his debut in Japan with the Tolqyo

Philharmonic Orchestra and toured Australia to great acclaim, leadingthe Sydney, Adelaide, Queensland, Western Australian, and TasmanianSymphony Orchestras. He has led family and educational concerts atCarnegie Hall with the Orchestra of St. Luke's, the Saint LouisSymphony Orchestra and the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra.Operatic engagements include productions at Op eraTheatre of SaintLouis and Opera Memphis and he has appeared at summer festivalsincluding the Grant Park Music Festival, Eastern Music Festival, andWoodstock Mozart Festival

David Loebel is a recipient of the prestigions SeaverA.[ationalEndowment for the Arts Conductors Award. An equally articulatecommunicator off the podium, he is a popular speaker and hosts TheMemphis Symphony Radio Hour on public radio station WKNO-FM.His writings on music have been widely published, including programnotes for Telarc recordings. With the Grant Park Symphony Orchestraand Chorus he recorded the critically acclaimed CD Independence Eveat Grant Park.

Active in the training of young musicians, Maestro Loebel has beenConductor-in-Residence of the New World Symphony and MusicDirector of the Saint Louis Symphony Youth Orchestra. He has alsoconducted the Civic Orchestra of Chicago, the National RepertoryOrchestra, and at conservatories including The Juilliard School, I.[ewEngland Conservatory, Cleveland Institute of Music, San FranciscoConservatory of Music, and Indiana University. As a mentor toconductors, he has served on the faculties of the League of AmericanOrchestras' Conducting Workshop, the I(ennedy Center's NationalConducting Institute, and the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music.

Piano Spheres, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA),Zipper Hall, Cistermrisica, International Music Festival P6voa doVarzim, Yamaha's YASI, SCRIME, and Los Angeles Sonic Odyssey. Anew CD, Hyper-Counterpointt, is scheduled for release in May of 2009.

Andreia Pinto-Correia: Acanto

Born in Lisbor, Portugal, Andreia Pinto-Correia is currently pursuing a

composition doctoral degree at the New England Conservatoly,

studying with Michael Gandolfi, after having received her Master'sdegree there as student of Bob Brookmeyer. She started her musicalstudies in Lisbon at the Academia de Amadores de Mrisica. Originally aperformer, she dedicated herself to composition in 2002, after beingunable to perform due to an accident.

Acanto is an architectonic ornamentation inspired by the leaves of aplant native to Mediterranean humid climates (acanthus mollis). InPortuguese or Spanish language it may also be written as a cantomeaning as in 'to sing'. The idea for this piece derives from the

manipulation of a simple melodic cell, an ornament that travels throughthe work appearing in different instruments or combination ofinstruments, registers, and pitch/rhyhmic mutations. Thus, the threemovements represent varied texfuralrcalizations of the same ornament.Sometimes I use particular features of a movement across movementboundaries, resulting in an organic use of the concept of memory andanticipation. The third and last movement, Adagio molto, is modeledafter the third movement of Three Places in New England by CharlesIves. Here, the Ltse of ornamentation is expanded to form a simplelullaby played by the vibraphone while the rest of the orchestra playstransformations, mainly texfural, of my original cell.

Mentor Composers

Michael Gandolfi

Michael Gandolfi was bom into a musical environment in which histwo older sisters, both accomplished pianists, were actively performingtraditional classical repertoire. Concurrent with this exposure was akeen interest in the worlds of rock and jazz music. He quicklydeveloped improvisational skills, beginning at age eight as a self-taught

guitarist, and became increasingly interested in music composition,taking formal study in his early teens. His early compositions earned

awards from ASCAP and from the American Society of UniversityComposers and fellowships for sflidy at the Yale Summer School ofMusic and Art, the Composers Conference, and the Tanglewood MusicCenter. He received his formal education at the New EnglandConservatory of Music.

Gandolfi recently completed a Meet The Composer Music Aliveresidency with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, during which the ASOpremiered his new work The Garden of Cosmic Speculation. Followingthe premiere performance, The Garden of Cosmic Speculation was

recorded and released on the Telarc label. A new recording of otherorchestral and large ensemble works, Y2K Compliant, was also released

in early 2008 by the Boston Modern Orchestra Project.

Other ensembles who have performed his music include theTanglewood Music Center Orchestra, Speculum Musicae, and Orpheus

Chamber Orchestra. Gandolfi has taught at Harvard Universlf, PhillipsAndover Academy, the New England Conservatory of Music (where heseryes as chairman of the composition department), Indiana Universityand is presently on faculty at the Tanglewood Music Center.

The breadth of Gandolfi's musical interests encompasses not onlycontemporary concert music, but also jarz, blues, and rock, by whichroute he first became a musician. his music has been recorded on theTelarc, BMOP Sound, Detrtsche Grammophon, CR[, Innova, andKlavier labels.

Melinda V/agner

Melinda Wagner received her graduate degrees from the University ofChicago and the Universlty of Pennsylvania, where she studied withRichard Wernick, George Crumb, Shulamit Ran, ffid Iay Reise. Hermusic has been performed by the Chicago Symphony, AmericanComposers Orchestra, the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center,the Society of New Music, the National Symphony Orchestra, theToronto Symphony, the I(ansas City Symphony, the StaatskapelleBerlin, and other leading organizations.

Wagner is the recipient of numerous honors, including an award fromthe American Academy of Arts and Letters, fellowships from theGuggenheim Memorial Foundation and Howard Foundation (BrownUniverslty), three ASCAP Young Composer Awards, and commissionsfrom the Barlow Foundation, the Charnber Music Society of LincolnCenter, the Mary Flagler Cary Charitable Trust, the Fromm Foundation(Harvard University), the I(ouss evrtzT<y Foundation, the Ernst andYoung Emerging Composers Fund, the American Brass Quintet, andguitarist David Starobin.. In 1999, Ms. Wagner was awarded thePulitzer Prize in Music for her Concerto for Flute, Strings and

Percussion. Her compositions are published by Theodore Presser.

Wagner has taught at the University of Pennsylvania, SwarthmoreCollege, Syracuse Universlff, and Hunter College. She has lectured atmany schools including Yale, Cornell, Juilliard, and Mannes College,and has served as Composer-in-Residence at the University of Texas(Austin) and at the Bravo! Vail Valley Music Festival.

Conductor

David Loebel

Noted for performances that combine innate musicality withinterpretive insight, David Loebel celebrates his tenth anniversary as

Music Director and Conductor of the Memphis Symphony Orchestrathis season. Prior to his appointment in Memphis, he enjoyed a decade-long association with the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra, serving as

Associate and then Associate Principal Conductor, as well as ArtisticDirector of its summer festival, Classics in the Loop.

During Maestro Loebel's tenure the Memphis Symphony Orchestra hasentered aperiod of notable artistic and organizational growth. He hasbroadened its repertoire, introducing over 150 works new to theorchestra and its audience. Under his leadership, the MSO has beenhonored four times by ASCAP and the League of American Orchestrasfor its advenfuresome programming of contemporary rnusic. He led theorchestra into its new home, the Cannon Center for the PerformingArts, and helped spearhead its innovative community engagementinitiatives.As a guest conductor, David Loebel has appeared with the Philadelphia