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Necessity is the mother of, for
both composers and performers of this age. If a group of
talented musicians who love new music wish to perform
together, but their instrumentation does not fit
traditional ensemble templates, do they give up?
Certainly not, as the musicians of the Cygnus Ensemble
prove. Their instrumentation is unusual, but their blend
of flute, oboe, violin, cello and two guitars does have
precedent in the "broken consort" of
Elizabethan times, with its blend of recorders, viols,
and lutes (and in fact, the ensemble is not so far from
that of much chamber music, as soon as one realizes the
two guitars can fulfill the textural role usually taken
by a piano). Further, these players know that if they
announce their availability, composers will come. In
fact, composers relish the chance to create new
repertoire as much as performers, since their work may
come to define a sound others will want to exploit. And
Cygnus's sound is infectious—light and clear,
capable of both delicacy and drive, timbrally rich,
transparent yet able to accomodate whatever degree
complexity one might desire.
Sebastian Currier is a New York composer whose music
defies easy categorization. It is more synthetic than
eclectic, blending a variety of elements into a seamless
personal whole. (As just one example, his Theo's
Notebook, the musical diary of an imaginary composer, is
one of the most original piano works of the 1990's.)
Broken Consort (1996) gains its name from the
aformentioned Elizabethan term, and while Currier was
inspired by that ancient sound, his own take on this
ensemble timbre is utterly twentieth-century. The piece
combines a highly continous flow with lightning-fast
splices of material, cinematic in nature. There is a
Stravinskian propulsion that seems to unite the most
disparate materials; like the music of that master, this
dances with a vengeance.
John Halle comes from somewhere else entirely. A talented
jazz pianist, his Spooks (1996) has a subversive agenda,
using elements of pop and minimalism. The title refers to
clandestine operatives who are used to infiltrate groups,
translated musically into the user-friendly blues riffs
which open the piece. But these musical ideas are in a
constant state of mutation, assuming different guises (a
little like the virtual "agents" of The
Matrix). They lead the music to more melancholic and
chromatic moments, as well as to farther-flung
explorations of pure sound and texture. By the piece's
end, we may not be sure exactly where we are (indeed,
much of the original spirit of the work returns), but we
certainly know we've gone somewhere.
Charles Wuorinen is one of the most eminent musicians in
New York, a multiple threat as composer, conductor,
pianist, polemicist. While identified as his generation's
leading exponent of serialism, in fact he has so
internalized the basic techniques of his craft that his
music now is essentially "intuitive" the same
way it was for masters of the tonal tradition. The 1997-8
Fenton Songs are concise and incisive settings of four
love poems by James Fenton, with whom the composer is
collaborating on an opera, the libretto based on Salman
Rushdie's Haroun and the Sea of Stories. The composer
comments that the texts "progress from public to
private, from agitation to repose, with local ups and
downs along the way." Certainly the final song,
"Hinterhof", is goal of the set, with both its
elegaic tone and its final consonant chord, a hard-won
instant of serenity.
A fundamental lyricism has been a defining characteristic
of Chester Biscardi's music throughout his career, and
Resisting Stillness (1996), for the two guitars of
Cygnus, is no exception. Unlike the preceding three
pieces of the program, this is music whose rhythmic sense
is extremely fluid and liesurely, which projects its
meaning above all through the delicate interplay of
timbre and pitch. Like much of Biscardi's work, there is
an impressionistic sensitivity to the expressive power of
pure sound, wedded to a bel canto line. The two guitars
in fact become like a single dreamy meta-instrument,
dropping handfuls of glistening harmonics which dapple
the music's surface like light on water. This work was
also commissioned by the International Guitar Festival of
Morelia (Michoacan, Mexico) for William Anderson and Oren
Fader.
David Lang has always searched for ways to tweak
classical music conventions, which is immediately
suggested by such titles as Eating Live Monkeys and
Lying/CheatingStealing. Frag is an abbreviation for
fragmentation bomb, though the music is more subversive
than revolutionary. Written in 1984, the work attempts to
completely demystify itself, laying bare all its
technique for any listener to comprehend. The music
consists of a single melodic line, presented in a sort of
mutating unison by the trio of flute, oboe, and cello
(the latter in very high register pizzicato). Only near
the end does a simple counterpoint emerge between a
pointillistic flute and a slow singing line in the other
two instruments, as though a new sort of music is
beginning to evolve out of the primal monophony which
preceded it.
William Anderson is one of Cygnus's two guitarists, and
his 1994-5 diptych Ear Conception shows an instinctive
feel for the gossamer textures spun by his instrument.
Inspired by a hymn whose first line states, "Thou
that hast conceived by ear...", its two movements
explore different but complementary states—the
composer speaks of agape/eros, immanence/transcendence,
amongst others. In purely musical terms, the music first
presents a world of delicate, floating sounds, rhythmic
not in a pulsed sense, but more like the lapping of
waves. Out of this "oscillating stillness"
emerges the second movement, which becomes dancelike and
overtly gracious in its sounds and gestures. And near its
conclusion, a magical stroke occurs. While the sound of a
glass harmonica (Benjamin Franklin's invention) has been
a part of the piece throughout, it now rises to a new
prominence, giving a glistening sheen to chords. The
music seems to move into a new realm entirely, a form of
"transcendence" given very concrete musical
form.
While decades of acclaim have established Anthony Braxton
as a master of progressive jazz, he finds that label
constricting, and justifiably so. In fact, Braxton has
carved out a reputation as one of the leaders within that
world where notated and improvised traditions intersect.
His equal devotion to European and African-American
traditions make him a truly multicultural composer, and
also one who attracts controversial reactions from both
ends of the musical spectrum. His 1996 Composition No.186
is part of his "Ghost-Trance" series, pieces
whose basic materials have a hypnotic uniformity (in this
case represented by the even rhythms and unison texture
which pervades the ensemble for large stretches of the
piece). But this uniformity is deceptive; it exists in
large part as a template against which we become aware of
very different events occurring. The score is single
line, without specified instrumentation or even clefs.
Braxton gives this freedom so as to allow the performers
to bend time, speeding up and slowing down the tempo of
the music at will, to similarly inflect the sound with
slippery glissandi (sliding tones), and to disrupt the
regularity by allowing overlays of improvisation, or
interpolations of other pieces of his. Thus the piece
becomes very much a collaboration between the composer, a
type of "prime mover" who plants a musical
seed, and the performers, who realize his concept by
bringing their own creative ideas to the work.
Robert Pollock, in his Cygnature Piece (1997), explores
something of the same terrain as Anderson, but the music
is more overtly dancy. What really drives the sound is
the use of mandolin on the second guitar part. The first
movement has almost the feel of a fandango with its
rhythmic strumming, and in the second, the dance rhythms
begin to support a tune whose directness imbues the music
with a freshness and exuberance that belies the
refinement of the writing. Pollock has created music
which exploits the quintessential Cygnus
sound—incisive and lilting—and makes a perfect
coda to this ensemble recital.
—Robert Carl
The CYGNUS ENSEMBLE, founded in 1986 and based in New
York City, interprets many periods and styles of music
with its unique instrumentation and musical breadth.
The musicians of Cygnus are experts in styles spanning
from Argentinean tango to the music of Harry Partch and
Milton Babbitt, and they engage audiences by
imaginatively exploring today's many musical languages.
The group's core of two guitars, flute, oboe, violin and
cello is inspired by the 17th Century Broken Consort, and
provides composers and audiences with sounds and ideas
not available in other ensembles. Cygnus is particularly
active in promoting the composition of new music and has
commissioned many new works by a diverse collection of
American composers. As of this writing, thirty-six pieces
have been written for and premiered by the Cygnus
Ensemble.
Cygnus performs throughout the world, and presents an
annual New York City concert series in Merkin Concert
Hall. They have toured Holland and Denmark, reached tens
of thousands of listeners through a Polish National Radio
broadcast, and performed a recital in Moscow, Russia,
followed by a week-long residency in the new music
festival, "Europe/Asia" in Kazan,Tatarstan.
Cygnus has appeared at festivals such as the Festival of
New American Music at the California State University at
Sacramento and the Waterloo Festival, New Jersey.
Cygnus is the recipient of numerous grants, including
awards from the New York State Council on the Arts, the
BMI Foundation, the Aaron Copland Fund, the Ditson Fund,
the Kosciuszko Foundation, the American Composers Forum,
the Koussevitsky Music Foundation of the Library of
Congress, and the Mary Flagler Cary Fund.
The Cygnus Ensemble is a not-for-profit organization
whose artistic direction is guided collectively by
members of the ensemble: Jacqui Carrasco, violin; John
Whitfield, cello; Tara Helen O'Connor, flute; Jacqueline
Leclair, oboe; Oren Fader and William Anderson, guitars.
Guest Artists:
Pianist Joan Forsyth is from Vancouver, British Columbia.
She is active as a chamber musician, recitalist and
soloist with orchestra, appearing at the Kennedy Center
with the Theater Chamber Players, soloist with the
Westchester Philharmonic, and tours in Europe with the
Cygnus Ensemble. She has recorded for CRI, and
Soundspells Productions, and has co-authored a book on
the music of Robert Schumann. Ms. Forsyth now teaches
privately in Bronxville where her studio is full and very
active.
Versatile soprano Elizabeth Farnum specializes in 20th
century music and is an active performer in the oratorio
and recital fields. In high demand for her performances
of new music, she has premiered pieces by Luciano Berio,
Tristan Keuris and John Schlenck at Alice Tully Hall.
Other premieres include Charles Wuorinen's Fenton Songs,
Toby Twining's Chrysalid Requiem, James Bassi's Carol
Symphony, Anthony Braxton's opera, Shala Fears for the
Poor, in which she created the role of Alva, and Roland
Moser's Nach Deutsche Volksliederen with modern music
ensemble Parnassus. In the oratorio field, Elizabeth has
performed much of the standard repertoire, appearing as
guest soloist with such orchestras as the American
Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Leon Botstein, the
Jupiter Symphony and the Bronx Arts Ensemble. She is a
member of the acclaimed early music group Pomerium, and
has appeared as soloist with the Waverly Consort, Musica
Sacra, BachWorks and the New York Virtuoso Singers. Ms.
Farnum is featured on recordings of Koch International,
Helicon, Bis, Vox and New World Records. She has recorded
four CD's for Deutsche Grammophon with Pomerium, the
third of which was nominated for a Grammy in 1999.
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