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Notturno (1973)
| composer |
Donald Martino (1931-2005) |
| performers |
eighth blackbird:
Molly Alicia Barth, piccolo, flute, alto flute
Michael J. Maccaferri, clarinet, bass clarinet
Matthew Albert, violin, viola
Nicholas Photinos, cello
Matthew L. Duvall, percussion
Lisa Kaplan, piano |
| publisher |
E. C. Shirmer Music (BMI)http://www.ecspublishing.com
|
| recording |
Live concert performance at The University of the South, Sewanee, Tennessee, February 20, 2000 |
| duration |
16:31 |
eighth blackbird's performance of Notturno is the first time the piece has been performed without a conductor. Donald Martino:
"Notturno was composed in 1973 on commission from the Naumburg Foundation for Speculum Musicae. It received its premiere performance by that ensemble on May 15, 1973 at Alice Tully Hall, Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, New York, and the following year received the Pulitzer Prize for Music.
"Notturno is cast in nineteen parts plus a codetta, whose sequence of reminiscences of things past emerges from the ever-sounding but ever-instrumentally mutating 'tonic' note D. The parts group themselves into three larger sections, which one may regard as movements -- although my conception was of an uninterrupted continuity. At one level, Notturno is drama ... a drama played out by the personas of the self as portrayed by the performers of the ensemble.
"The first and last movements each contain nine parts contrasting most noticeably in tempo, gesture, and range, but in other aspects as well. Here, ideas are presented in highly mercurial fashion, as if, metaphorically speaking, the self is nervously sorting through its life experiences during that dream-like state which often overcomes us at day's end. The central movement, on the other hand, slowly and gradually unveils a series of long melodious lines. It is a time for pause, for reflection, for supposition -- and suddenly, without warning, for a revelation (in the form of musical climax) which will initiate new understanding. [...]
"As I was composing it, Notturno seemed to me to evoke not so much the external sounds, but rather the feelings one might experience in the dark hours; and from this perception, rather late in the creative process, it got its name. One listener has described it as 'Nocturnal Theater of the Soul.' I am very pleased with that poetic description."
Donald Martino's (1931-2005) musical influences included his jazz clarinet training, Italian bandsman Frank Lieto, twelve-note compositional techniques, and the music of Belá Bartók and Milton Babbitt. He used the twelve-note system "in a more personal manner" (Martino), creating works notable for their expressive intensity.
Born in Plainfield, New Jersey, Martino began clarinet, saxophone, and oboe lessons at the age of nine; he played in various bands as a teenager, and started composing at 15. He went on to study composition at Syracuse and Princeton Universities, where his teachers included Ernst Bacon, Milton Babbitt, and Roger Sessions. Between 1954-1956 he also studied with Luigi Dallapiccola on a Fulbright scholarship to Florence, Italy. Martino's academic career continued as a professor at Princeton University in New Jersey, Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, and as chair of the composition department at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston, Massachusetts. In the 1980's he taught at Brandeis University in Waltham, Massachusetts, and Harvard University in Cambridge, from which he retired as professor emeritus in 1992.
Martino's many honors include the Brandeis University Creative Arts Award, three Guggenheim fellowships, Kennedy Center Friedheim Award, and a Pulitzer Prize for his chamber work Notturno (1973). He was active as a guest lecturer and composer-in-residence at the Atlantic Center for the Arts, Ernest Bloch Music Festival, Festival Internacional de Música de Morelia, May in Miami, Pontino Festival, and Tanglewood. Commissions have come from the Coolidge, Fromm, Koussevitzky, and Naumburg Foundations; Boston, Chicago, and San Francisco Symphonies; and the Paderewski Fund. Martino's music is published by his company Dantalian, and has been recorded on the Albany, Boston, Capstone, Centaur, CRI, Koch International, New World, and Ongaku labels.
related websites
http://www.dantalian.com
eighth blackbird is a chamber ensemble of young musicians who perform contemporary music primarily from the United States. The ensemble has worked closely with such composers as Joan Tower, Fred Lerdahl, Donald Martino, Andrew Imbrie, and Michael Torke. In 1998, eighth blackbird was the first contemporary ensemble ever to win First Prize at the Concert Artists Guild International Competition; it was recently honored as the winner of the 2000 Walter W. Naumburg Foundation Award. The ensemble has performed at venues and festivals throughout the United States, and has appeared with the Opera Theatre in Lucca, Italy. The members of eighth blackbird founded the ensemble at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music in Ohio and hold an Artist Diploma in Chamber Music from the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory, Ohio. Their debut CD Round Nut Tool was released in 1999.
related websites
http://www.eighthblackbird.com
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