Karis Stretton

images, memories: reflections in sound

A flexible programme of works relating to images. Some pieces relate to or were inspired by visual art, others reflect upon memories and some evoke particular settings.

Visual layers, in the form of films created to run in parallel with the music, accompany some pieces.

Louis Andriessen (b.1939)
----------Image de Moreau (1999)

David Lang (b.1957)
----------Beach (1997) from Memory Pieces
----------* with optional visuals

Claude Debussy (1862 - 1918)
----------Préludes Book 1 (1909-10):
---------- - No. 5 Les collines d'Ancapri
---------- - No. 6 Des pas sur la neige
----------Préludes Book 2 (1912-13):
---------- - No. 5 Bruyères

George Crumb (b.1929)
----------A Little Suite for Christmas, A.D.1979 (1980)

___________

Olivier Messiaen (1908 - 1992)
----------Vingt Regards sur l‘Enfant-Jésus (1944):
---------- - No. 11 Première communion de la Vierge

Oliver Knussen (b. 1952)
----------Prayer Bell Sketch (1997) written in memory of Toru Takemitsu

Frederic Rzewski (b.1938)
----------Winnsboro cotton mill blues (1979)

Katarina Miljkovic (b.1959)
----------nkScape (2008)
----------* with pre-recorded electronics and visuals

concert duration approximately 80 mins

Programme may also include:

Edward Cowie (b.1943)
----------Preludes Book 1, Water (2004-05):
---------- - No. 5 St. Maxime Beach (Provence, France) D major
---------- - No. 6 Tennessee River (Tenn., USA) D minor

Howard Skempton (b.1947)
----------Reflections 1-11 (1999 - 2002)

Toru Takemitsu (1930 - 1996)
----------Rain Tree Sketch (1982) written in memory of Maurice Fleuret
----------Rain Tree Sketch 2 (1992) written in memory of Olivier Messiaen

Adoration of the Magi, one of Giotto's Nativity Frescoes in The Arena Chapel at Padua to which Crumb's A Little Suite For Christmas, A.D. 1979 relates.

Andriessen on Image de Moreau: "the piece soon turns towards French late-Romanticism, the time and spirit of painters like Redon and Gustave Moreau. The paintings of Moreau combine large areas of abstraction with very sharp figurative details, faces and objects, opening up unexpected emotional feelings."

Still from the visual layer of Miljkovic's nkScape.

Knussen on Prayer Bell Sketch, written in memory of Takemitsu: "I took a chord that he used in virtually every one of his pieces in the ‘80s ...and I took various little objects that reminded me of him...and I then fashioned a little piece from that; it was like taking his chord for a walk around various objects that I associated with him."

Rowing Home the Schoof-Stuff by Peter Emerson whose photographs inspired Skempton's Reflections.