PACIFIC SYMPHONYCARL ST.CLAIR

SYMPHONY IN G# MINOR

E L L I O T G O L D E N T H A L

P CP CP CP CP CP CP C

Elliot Goldenthals music is published byZarathustra Music

ASCAP Zarathustra MusicExecutive Producers:Elliot Goldenthal & Richard Gurin

Made in the USA

Zarathustra Music

Elliot Goldenthals music is published byZarathustra Music

ASCAP Zarathustra MusicExecutive Producers:Elliot Goldenthal & Richard Gurin

Made in the USA

Zarathustra Music

01

48

Elliot Goldenthal (b.1954)

SYMPHONY IN G# MINOR (2014)

1 MOVEMENT I Moderato con Moto 17:

2 MOVEMENT II Rondo Agitato 7:

PACIFIC SYMPHONYCarl St.Clair

depart the stage to place themselves at roto-toms stations throughout the audito-rium) that leads to the climax.

This culmination, with a couple final allu-sions to the motivic material, ultimately gives way to an all out orchestral assault: jagged and propulsive rhythms are played antiphonally are exchanged in the rafters of the theater surrounding the audience with an antiphonal barrage, a hailstorm of rrhythmically-charged particles. At the conclusion, the percussionist on stage is joined by the percussionists in the theater and the orchestra in full crescendo to evoke something primal: the first wireless communication of drums being beaten over distance. This is a symphony built ffrom the smallest motivic elements. Yet it's a Symphony of complex musical thought which is also extremely personal.

- Richard Gurin, 2014

nnation before a jolting hammer-blow-of-fate in pure D-minor, a tritone from G-Sharp minor. Then in defiance of its character up to this point, a gritty raspy saxophone plays the main motive marked in the score to be played growl nasty in triple forte. The final moments feature the harp hitting the lowest strings with its tuning wrench and the string playing col legno bringing this massive paragraph to an end.

The first movement is designed to feel longer than it is, longer than would be permissible in the modern era. The listener has traveled an already substantial length of road before arriving at the second movement Rondo Agitato.

TheThe motive for the rondo agitato is the same descending four-note figure that appears at the beginning of the Symphony. In the first 14 measures a string quartet segregates itself from the rest of the string group. This time around, the principal motive is developed against a kinetic, nernervous, and gnarly setting. This break-neck race runs into a moment of extreme violence before the original material from the first movement is restated in the same mood. Yet this time with additional coun-terpoint in the violin section. This is a calming interlude (during which, in livperformance three of the percussionists

sisive laying out of ideas in the first movement the exposition lasts well over six minutes. After hearing the deconstruc-tion of this already sparse material scat-tered throughout the orchestra, the orchestra momentarily picks up the pace. The tempo moves along "moderato con moto" (moderate with motion) and there is a sense of time almost standing still. This is achieved with 12 bars of melting half notes with unevenly spaced rests. This technique seduces he listener into a sense of time slowing to a crawl without losing momentum.

The listener anticipates a B section in a faster tempo - perhaps equally as expan-sive as the A section exposition. Rather than quicken in tempo, the recurrence of the minor third motive expands into a motive within the same rhythm. The music then falls into an elegiac section: TheThe strings divided into nine separate parts. Deeply mournful, introspective, and canonic the whole section is an expan-sion of the first four-note motive. This is music slowly rising out of an abyss. The four-note motive then expands into a six-note theme essentially an inversion, transformed into an up-reaching motive.

This huge first movement comes to a very quiet close with the motive rocking back and forth, lulling us into a sense of resig-

depart the stage to place themselves at roto-toms stations throughout the audito-rium) that leads to the climax.

This culmination, with a couple final allu-sions to the motivic material, ultimately gives way to an all out orchestral assault: jagged and propulsive rhythms are played antiphonally are exchanged in the rafters of the theater surrounding the audience with an antiphonal barrage, a hailstorm of rrhythmically-charged particles. At the conclusion, the percussionist on stage is joined by the percussionists in the theater and the orchestra in full crescendo to evoke something primal: the first wireless communication of drums being beaten over distance. This is a symphony built ffrom the smallest motivic elements. Yet it's a Symphony of complex musical thought which is also extremely personal.

- Richard Gurin, 2014

nnation before a jolting hammer-blow-of-fate in pure D-minor, a tritone from G-Sharp minor. Then in defiance of its character up to this point, a gritty raspy saxophone plays the main motive marked in the score to be played growl nasty in triple forte. The final moments feature the harp hitting the lowest strings with its tuning wrench and the string playing col legno bringing this massive paragraph to an end.

The first movement is designed to feel longer than it is, longer than would be permissible in the modern era. The listener has traveled an already substantial length of road before arriving at the second movement Rondo Agitato.

TheThe motive for the rondo agitato is the same descending four-note figure that appears at the beginning of the Symphony. In the first 14 measures a string quartet segregates itself from the rest of the string group. This time around, the principal motive is developed against a kinetic, nernervous, and gnarly setting. This break-neck race runs into a moment of extreme violence before the original material from the first movement is restated in the same mood. Yet this time with additional coun-terpoint in the violin section. This is a calming interlude (during which, in livperformance three of the percussionists

sisive laying out of ideas in the first movement the exposition lasts well over six minutes. After hearing the deconstruc-tion of this already sparse material scat-tered throughout the orchestra, the orchestra momentarily picks up the pace. The tempo moves along "moderato con moto" (moderate with motion) and there is a sense of time almost standing still. This is achieved with 12 bars of melting half notes with unevenly spaced rests. This technique seduces the listener into a sense of time slowing to a crawl without losing momentum.

The listener anticipates a B section in a faster tempo - perhaps equally as expan-sive as the A section exposition. Rather than quicken in tempo, the recurrence of the minor third motive expands into a motive within the same rhythm. The music then falls into an elegiac section: TheThe strings divided into nine separate parts. Deeply mournful, introspective, and canonic the whole section is an expan-sion of the first four-note motive. This is music slowly rising out of an abyss. The four-note motive then expands into a six-note theme essentially an inversion, transformed into an up-reaching motive.

This huge first movement comes to a very quiet close with the motive rocking back and forth, lulling us into a sense of resig-

A Note from the Composer:ThisThis is my second occasion to compose a work for Pacific Symphony and its conduc-tor Carl St.Clair. The first time was in 1995 with my oratorio Fire Water Paper. Maestro St.Clair imagined a work commemorating the end of military conflict in Vietnam. It was an expansive three-movement work, ovover an hour long, with a full SATB chorus and soloists, plus a cello obbligato. That work was a full evening of music.

This time, according to the design of the program, I was asked to write a Symphony no more than 25 minutes in length. This was more of a challenge for me as I tend to be expansive in my writing when I get rolling. To offset this challenge, I needed to compose a first movement, "Moderato concon Moto" with the intent to "feel" more expansive than its 13 or 14 minute duration. I did this by opening up vistas by featuring the sections of the orchestra rather than presenting the orchestra as a block - with its composites melding as one.

As to the key signature G-Sharp Minor: A-Flat was always a key I was attracted to, even as a 10-year-old. The note G-Sharp on my family spinet had a particular timbre that has stayed with me since then. On a theoretical note, G-Sharp Minor only rep-resents the place where the Symphony sits;sits; it is not obliged to follow chromatic harmonic tradition. This key also creates

A Note from the Composer:ThisThis is my second occasion to compose a work for Pacific Symphony and its conduc-tor Carl St.Clair. The first time was in 1995 with my oratorio Fire Water Paper. Maestro St.Clair imagined a work commemorating the end of military conflict in Vietnam. It was an expansive three-movement work, ovover an hour long, with a full SATB chorus and soloists, plus a cello obbligato. That work was a full evening of music.

This time, according to the design of the program, I was asked to write a Symphony no more than 25 minutes in length. This was more of a challenge for me as I tend to be expansive in my writing when I get rolling. To offset this challenge, I needed to compose a first movement, "Moderato concon Moto" with the intent to "feel" more expansive than its 13 or 14 minute duration. I did this by opening up vistas by featuring the sections of the orchestra rather than presenting the orchestra as a block - with its composites melding as one.

As to the key signature G-Sharp Minor: A-Flat was always a key I was attracted to, even as a 10-year-old. The note G-Sharp on my family spinet had a particular timbre that has stayed with me since then. On a theoretical note, G-Sharp Minor only rep-resents the place where the Symphony sits;sits; it is not obliged to follow chromatic harmonic tradition. This key also creates

allall happens against a rocking, gentle per-colation on the harp and violas. The four-note motive is boldly stated at the end of the first movement and in the second movement in diminution form: playing faster in duration from the original. This four-note and five-note "Codex" appears throughout both movements.

The second movement possesses more density in its construction. It features the brass and percussion sections of the orchestra. This shear force and harmonic density provide a true contrast to the expansive vistas of the first movement. The percussion, without giving away the end,hasend,has a moment in which the percus-sionists have a conversation that attempts to bridge the gap of human long distance communication.... the first wireless conversation that existed mil-lennia ago, with hands and drum, warnings, war songs and love songs across tree tops, mountains, and time.

-Elliot Goldenthal #!"%

ttension for the string ensemble, with no opened strings and it demands great con-centration on intonation. The collective strings must listen to the other players to arrive at that goal of strong intonation; that goal itself is then intensified in the middle of the movement where the string sesection is played divisi (divided) from its normal state of four parts into nine. In one of the most exposed and expressive entrances in the first movement, the five-note ascending motive, with its reaching" aspirations, tries to climb to the height of the violin section. The motive is also sliced into nine, to state the motive with tension and pull against the dissonant invading other strings.

In general, the four-note and five-note motives show up as augmentation and diminution. This kind of motivic stinginess presents itself in the two movements of this work: the bassoon states the first motive in the first movement in a four-note descending passage followed by a five-note motive in the oboe section. This

allall happens against a rocking, gentle per-colation on the harp and violas. The four-note motive is boldly stated at the end of the first movement and in the second movement in diminution form: playing faster in duration from the original. This four-note and five-note "Codex" appears throughout both movements.

The second movement possesses more density in its construction. It features the brass and percussion sections of the orchestra. This shear force and harmonic density provide a true contrast to the expansive vistas of the first movement. The percussion, without giving away the end,hasend,has a moment in which the percus-sionists have a conversation that attempts to bridge the gap of human long distance communication.... the first wireless conversation that existed mil-lennia ago, with hands and drum, warnings, war songs and love songs across tree tops, mountains, and time.

-Elliot Goldenthal #!"%

ttension for the string ensemble, with no opened strings and it demands great con-centration on intonation. The collective strings must listen to the other players to arrive at that goal of strong intonation; that goal itself is then intensified in the middle of the movement where the string sesection is played divisi (divided) from its normal state of four parts into nine. In one of the most exposed and expressive entrances in the first movement, the five-note ascending motive, with its reaching" aspirations, tries to climb to the height of the violin section. The motive is also sliced into nine, to state the motive with tension and pull against the dissonant invading other strings.

In general, the four-note and five-note motives show up as augmentation and diminution. This kind of motivic stinginess presents itself in the two movements of this work: the bassoon states the first motive in the first movement in a four-note descending passage followed by a five-note motive in the oboe section. This

Carl St.Clair has served as Pacific Symphonys music director since the 1990-91 season. During his tenure, he has become widely recognized for his musically distin-guished performances, commitment to out-standing educational programs and innovative approaches to programming.

Among his creative endeavors with Pacific Symphony are: the vocal initiative, Symphonic Voices, inaugurated in 2011-12 with the concert-opera production of La Bohme, followed by Tosca, La Traviata and Carmen in continuing seasons; the 2009-10 creation of a series of multimedia concerts featuring inven-titive formats called Music Unwound; and the highly acclaimed American Composers Festival, which began in 2000.

In 2006-07, St.Clair led the orchestras historic move into the Rene and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall in Orange County, Calif. The move came on the heels of the landmark 2005-06 season that included St.Clair leading the Symphony on its first European tournine cities in three countries playing before capacity houseshouses and receiving extraordinary responses and reviews.

From 2008-10, St.Clair was general music director for the Komische Oper in Berlin, where he led productions such as La Traviata

(directed by Hans Neuenfels). He also served as general music director and chief conductor of the German National Theater and Staatskapelle (GNTS) in Weimar, Germany, where he led Wagners Ring Cycle to critical acclaim. He was the first non-European to hold his position at the GNTS; the role also gave him the distinction ofof simultaneously leading one of the newest orchestras in America and one of the oldest in Europe.

In 2014, St.Clair assumed the position as music director of the National Symphony Orchestra in Costa Rica. His international career also has him conducting abroad several months a year, and he has appeared with orchestras throughout the world. He was the principal guest conductor of the Radio Sinfonieorchester Stuttgart from 19981998-2004, where he completed a three-year recording project of the VillaLobos sympho-nies. He has also appeared with orchestras in Israel, Hong Kong, Japan, Australia, New Zealand and South America, and summer festi-vals worldwide.

In North America, St.Clair has led the Boston Symphony Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, Philadelphia Orchestra, Los Angeles Philhar-monic and the San Francisco, Seattle, Detroit, Atlanta, Houston, Indianapolis, Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver symphonies, among many.

Carl St.Clair has served as Pacific Symphonys music director since the 1990-91 season. During his tenure, he has become widely recognized for his musically distin-guished performances, commitment to out-standing educational programs and innovative approaches to programming.

Among his creative endeavors with Pacific Symphony are: the vocal initiative, Symphonic Voices, inaugurated in 2011-12 with the concert-opera production of La Bohme, followed by Tosca, La Traviata and Carmen in continuing seasons; the 2009-10 creation of a series of multimedia concerts featuring inven-titive formats called Music Unwound; and the highly acclaimed American Composers Festival, which began in 2000.

In 2006-07, St.Clair led the orchestras historic move into the Rene and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall in Orange County, Calif. The move came on the heels of the landmark 2005-06 season that included St.Clair leading the Symphony on its first European tournine cities in three countries playing before capacity houseshouses and receiving extraordinary responses and reviews.

From 2008-10, St.Clair was general music director for the Komische Oper in Berlin, where he led productions such as La Traviata

(directed by Hans Neuenfels). He also served as general music director and chief conductor of the German National Theater and Staatskapelle (GNTS) in Weimar, Germany, where he led Wagners Ring Cycle to critical acclaim. He was the first non-European to hold his position at the GNTS; the role also gave him the distinction ofof simultaneously leading one of the newest orchestras in America and one of the oldest in Europe.

In 2014, St.Clair assumed the position as music director of the National Symphony Orchestra in Costa Rica. His international career also has him conducting abroad several months a year, and he has appeared with orchestras throughout the world. He was the principal guest conductor of the Radio Sinfonieorchester Stuttgart from 19981998-2004, where he completed a three-year recording project of the VillaLobos sympho-nies. He has also appeared with orchestras in Israel, Hong Kong, Japan, Australia, New Zealand and South America, and summer festi-vals worldwide.

In North America, St.Clair has led the Boston Symphony Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, Philadelphia Orchestra, Los Angeles Philhar-monic and the San Francisco, Seattle, Detroit, Atlanta, Houston, Indianapolis, Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver symphonies, among many.

Pacific Symphony, led by Music Director Carl St.Clair, is the largest orchestra formed in the United States in the last 50 years. The orchestra is recognized as an outstanding ensemble making strides on both the national and international scene as well as in its own community of Orange County, California. Pacific SymphoSymphony offers moving musical experiences with repertoire ranging from the great orchestral masterworks to music from todays most prominent composers, highlighted by the annual American Composers Festival and a series of multi-media concerts called Music Unwound.

Pacific Symphony is dedicated to developing and promoting todays composers and expanding the orchestral repertoire illustrated through its many commissions and recordings, in-depth explorations of American artists and themes. Pacific Symphony has released a series of CDs featuring works commissionedcommissioned and performed by the Symphony. These include Richard Danielpours Toward a Season of Peace; Philip Glass The Passion of Ramakrishna; and Michael Daughertys Mount Rushmore, Radio City and

The Gospel According to Sister Aimee. Other commissioned works by the Symphony include Elliot Goldenthals Symphony in G-sharp Minor; William Bolcoms Songs of Lorca and Prometheus; and James Newton Howards I Would Plant a Tree. The Symphony has also commissioned and recorded An American RequiemRequiem by Danielpour and Goldenthals Fire Water Paper: A Vietnam Oratorio with cellist Yo-Yo Ma. Other recordings have included collaborations with such composers as Lucas Foss and Toru Takemitsu. It has also commissioned such leading composers as Paul Chihara, Daniel Catn, William Kraft, Ana Lara, TTobias Picker, Christopher Theofanidis, Frank Ticheli and Chen Yi.

The Symphonys innovative approaches to new works received the ASCAP Award for Adventurous Programming in 2005 and 2010. In 2010, Pacific Symphony was named one of five orchestras profiled by the League of American Orchestras in a study on innovation. In March 2006, the Symphony embarked on its first EuEuropean tour receiving an unprecedented 22 rave reviews.

Pacific Symphony, led by Music Director Carl St.Clair, is the largest orchestra formed in the United States in the last 50 years. The orchestra is recognized as an outstanding ensemble making strides on both the national and international scene as well as in its own community of Orange County, California. Pacific SymphoSymphony offers moving musical experiences with repertoire ranging from the great orchestral masterworks to music from todays most prominent composers, highlighted by the annual American Composers Festival and a series of multi-media concerts called Music Unwound.

Pacific Symphony is dedicated to developing and promoting todays composers and expanding the orchestral repertoire illustrated through its many commissions and recordings, in-depth explorations of American artists and themes. Pacific Symphony has released a series of CDs featuring works commissionedcommissioned and performed by the Symphony. These include Richard Danielpours Toward a Season of Peace; Philip Glass The Passion of Ramakrishna; and Michael Daughertys Mount Rushmore, Radio City and

The Gospel According to Sister Aimee. Other commissioned works by the Symphony include Elliot Goldenthals Symphony in G-sharp Minor; William Bolcoms Songs of Lorca and Prometheus; and James Newton Howards I Would Plant a Tree. The Symphony has also commissioned and recorded An American RequiemRequiem by Danielpour and Goldenthals Fire Water Paper: A Vietnam Oratorio with cellist Yo-Yo Ma. Other recordings have included collaborations with such composers as Lucas Foss and Toru Takemitsu. It has also commissioned such leading composers as Paul Chihara, Daniel Catn, William Kraft, Ana Lara, TTobias Picker, Christopher Theofanidis, Frank Ticheli and Chen Yi.

The Symphonys innovative approaches to new works received the ASCAP Award for Adventurous Programming in 2005 and 2010. In 2010, Pacific Symphony was named one of five orchestras profiled by the League of American Orchestras in a study on innovation. In March 2006, the Symphony embarked on its first EuEuropean tour receiving an unprecedented 22 rave reviews.

PACIFIC SYM PHONYPACIFIC SYM PHONY

PACIFIC SYM PHONYPACIFIC SYM PHONY

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