Here and Now, The

From Wind Repertory Project
Christopher Theofanidis

Christopher Theofanidis


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Subtitle: The Here and Now : For Soloists, Chorus, and Wind Ensemble


General Info

Year: 2005 / 2009
Duration: c. 35:00
Difficulty: (see Ratings for explanation)
Original Medium: Orchestra
Publisher: Bill Holab Music
Cost: Score and Parts – Rental?


Movements

1. Inside this new love, die
2. Is the one I love everywhere?
3. The sound of the resurrection
4. All day and night, music
5. Narrative I: The value of our souls
6I. Hear blessings dropping their blossoms around you
7. The one who pours is wilder than we
8. Narrative II: Three kinds of women
9. Drumsound rises
10. Spreading radiance
11. Narrative III: Insomnia
12. The urgency of love
13. The music of our final meeting


Instrumentation

(Needed - please join the WRP if you can help.)


Errata

None discovered thus far.


Program Notes

I first encountered Jalal ad-Din Rumi’s poetry in Rome seven years ago when I went to hear Philip Glass and Robert Wilson’s Monsters of Grace. I enjoyed the music enormously, but the thing that really moved me was Rumi’s poetry as translated by the great poet Coleman Barks. It was at once immediate and vivid, and it had a way of seeing things in which joy, love, and gratitude mingled with an underlying sense of longing and restlessness to return to the divine. The density of wisdom in this poetry really struck me, and I found myself focusing on particular lines in an almost mantra-like way, repeating them aloud over and over and writing musical responses to them.

Robert Spano called me in January 2004 and said that he wanted to commission a new work that involved the Atlanta Symphony Chorus -- maybe a ten- to twelve-minute a cappella work, or possibly a work for chorus with orchestra. I decided to do something with orchestra, but I couldn’t think of many ten- to twelve-minute pieces in that genre that really stood the test of time, and so I asked permission to write a larger work. One of Robert’s great attributes is his ultimate flexibility in working with composers (which must come from the fact that he is actually a composer himself), and he said yes.

I knew that I did not want to set larger sections of Rumi’s texts whole, but rather to set them in shorter, more compact ways -- the way the poetry actually spoke to me. I compiled thirteen short movements from the poetic fragments. These are mostly choral, but are broken up by some very brief movements for baritone solo (nos. 5, 8, 11), all less than a minute. They are like little parables with humor, and I felt they provided a kind of sonic relief to the choral movements. There is also a tenor and soprano duet with chorus (mvt. 12).

My deep thanks go to both Coleman for permission to use his marvelous translations, and to Robert for making this whole thing possible.

- Program Note by composer


Media


State Ratings

None discovered thus far.


Performances

To submit a performance please join The Wind Repertory Project

  • Rowan University (Glassboro, N.J.) Wind Ensemble (Joseph Higgins, conductor) – 19 October 2019
  • The Hartt School Wind Ensemble (Hartford, Conn.) (Glen Adsit, conductor) – 30 April 2019


Works for Winds by This Composer


Resources

  • Christopher Theofanidis website Accessed 19 October 2019
  • Theofanidis, C.; Barks, C. [2009?]. The Here and Now : For Soloists, Chorus, and Wind Ensemble : (2009)