Graduate Percussion Ensemble

Program

Topsy Turvy (2008) | Michael Udow (b. 1949)

Your Past Self is Dead (2023) | Melissa Wang (b. 1999)

Death Wish (2017) | Gemma Peacocke (b. 1984)

Vessel Redux (2018) | Michael Laurello (b. 1981)

(Un)wandering Souls (2021/2024) | Vivian Fung (b. 1975) 

PERSONNEL
Cahaya Drucilla
Chris Harris
Jacob Koch
Dean Kyle
 

PROGRAM NOTES
Michael Udow, Topsy Turvy (2008)
“Topsy-Turvy” was commissioned by my fine friend Professor Gang-ku Lee, and the Akademie Percussion Ensemble of Seoul, Korea. Professor Lee requested an exciting drumming work to close the percussion ensemble's spring 2008 concert touring program. One goal I had was to compose a rhythmically energized work that continually subverted the comfort zone common in most of the world's popular dance musics, while captivating – rather than losing – the interest of the sophisticated listener. This composition will most likely be felt and heard by the performers and the audiences as an American work because, although there is a sense of interdependence within the community of the ensemble, there also is a strong sense of independent confidence that is needed to achieve a performance that “cooks.”

After a brief introduction, the A Section commences with a jaunty Middle-Eastern or Bulgarian type of rhythmic groove. Counterpoint occurs by overlaying other beat-groupings of the basic sixteenth note pulse. Later, a 2/4 metered, seemingly stereotypical "rock" groove begins, but the listener is caught off balance by the use of odd numbered beat groupings that circumvent one's sense of proportional balance. Put simply, if a couple danced the Foxtrot, Samba, Waltz or Mambo to this work, they might fall over! It is no wonder that the majority of our dance music tends to be in duple meter because we are bi-peds, after all. If there is a colony in the universe where people walk about with five or seven legs, perhaps their music would tend to be more in 5/4 or 7/4 meters!

The B Section of this work is the tipping of my hat to the influential American composer Henry Cowell, whose students, among others, included John Cage and Lou Harrison.

Melissa Wang, Your Past Self (Is Dead) (2023)
“Your Past Self (Is Dead)” is a performance art & music work for a solo vocalist narrator and two or more percussionists. The composition is about failing to let go of intrusive thoughts, and the text works from the ideas in meditation. The percussionists improvise with the text.

Gemma Peacocke, Death Wish (2017)
I wrote Death Wish after watching a short film featuring New Zealand survivors of sexual assault. One of the survivors, Hinewirangi Kohu-Morgan, spoke about the out-of-control spiraling of her life for many years and how she developed what she called a death wish. In the piece I thought about the spooling and unspooling of energy and how we are all bound and driven by forces both within and beyond ourselves.

With the greatest of respect for Hinewirangi Kohu-Morgan who has used her life to create art and music and to help survivors of abuse and those who have perpetrated abuse.

Michael Laurello, Vessel Redux (2018)
The first iteration of this piece was a 2-minute miniature for solo percussion and stereo playback that I wrote when I was in grad school. It was my first piece for found-object percussion. During the previous summer, I had found a few large metal containers (vessels) at an antique shop in New Hampshire, and decided that I would build a piece around those sounds. One object was an old oilcan, another was a lobster pot...I can’t remember the others. I think I gravitated toward those sounds because of their imperfections. Vessel Redux takes this original miniature from my grad school days and adds an entirely different section, contrasting my musical interests from that time with my interests of today. This piece is dedicated with love and gratitude to Maria and Alex.

Vivian Fung, (Un)Wandering Souls II (2020)
My connection with Metropolis Ensemble and Andrew Cyr has been a long one, and when Andrew heard of my 2019 trip, he wanted to let me know that he also worked on a project involving survivors of the genocide, including the composer Him Sophy and the film director Rithy Panh. Bongsokol: A Requiem for Cambodia was an international success in 2017 and onward. The Cambodian Living Arts organization commissioned the work premiered by Metropolis Ensemble and then wanted to mount a 2020 online festival based in Requiem. Metropolis Ensemble and Cambodia Living Arts joined forces to commission a series of works, ‘variations’ if you will, that are inspired by the Requiem.

(Un)Wandering Souls is my 6-minute response to the Requiem - the melody is taken from the last scene - and the virtuosic treatment of it is my own. This 2024 version is revised from the original 2020 3-minute version that was created for this video by Rithy Panh and performed by Sandbox Percussion.