MEMETERIA

In honor of International Women’s Day: a salute to the bold, distinctive music of Joan Tower. Friday night’s Emerald City Music program featured Kristin Lee and Sandbox Percussion in works by three generations of women composers, including the Seattle premiere of her recent work To Sing or Dance.

Tower says that the piece grew out of a conversation with Arvo Pärt about the origins of music: “He felt music came from the voice (or singing) and I had a different idea that it came from the drum (or dancing).” She addresses the difference by writing for solo violin and percussion quartet, tackling the challenge of “how to have these two very different instruments in the same space, living fairly comfortably together” – the violin’s lyrical “song” gradually intertwines with the percussion’s rhythmic “dance.”

Tower’s inventive timbral colors and lively rhythmic counterpoint capped a terrific evening that also included the world premiere of Vivian Fung’s violin-and-percussion-orchestra concerto Goddess//Insect and Gabriella Smith’s Five.

Above is a rehearsal glimpse of To Sing or Dance with Sandbox Percussion for the 2024 world premiere (with violinist Soovin Kim).

And here’s an insightful closer look at Tower’s landmark Concerto for Orchestra from 1991:

Filed under: music news, women composers