The 2015 Fall Chamber Series continues this Sunday, Oct.
18, with a concert at 2 p.m. EDT featuring seven soloists performing 20th and
21st century works. The concert is free and no tickets are required and will
take place at John Philip Sousa Band Hall at the Marine Barracks Annex in
southeast Washington, D.C. Free parking is available under the overpass on 7th
street across from the Annex. The concert will also stream live on the Marine
Band website www.marineband.marines.mil.
The program will include solo works composed for viola,
violin, cello, trumpet, and percussion. According to concert coordinator cellist
Staff Sgt. Charlaine Prescott, each performer will demonstrate world-class
technical facility and musical intimacy with their intellectually challenging
but still approachable pieces.
The first half of the concert will include Until Next Time by Kenji Bunch; Eight Portraits for Violin Alone by
Virgil Thomson; and the world premierè of the multi-percussion work Impending Storm by the Master Sgt. Glenn
Paulson. In composing Impending Storm,
Paulson took field recordings of trains and the elements then collaborated with
the Marine Band recording lab personnel to add industrial and railroad sounds
to layers of recorded passages featuring Paulson on the marimba, toms, chimes, xylophone,
and bass drum. They then identified, manipulated and extracted rhythms from the
incidental sounds of the trains to create the recorded layers.
“There was a ‘chance’ element to this piece,” Paulson
said. “Whatever everyday sounds that occurred or happened by chance while
recording became a part of the piece. The everyday sounds add an interesting
rhythmic sense and unique timbre to the sounds of the vibraphone, drums, tam
tams, and cymbals used on stage.”
The second half of the concert includes Julie-O by Mark Summer; Cadenza per
viola sola by Krzysztof Penderecki; and Sonate No. 6 in E, Opus 27, No. 6 by Eugène
Ysaÿe. It will also highlight Staff Sgt. Brandon Eubank performing Stanley Friedman’s
contemporary piece Solus for
unaccompanied solo trumpet. According to the composer:
The piece makes fun of both
trumpeters and composers who take themselves too seriously. The performer
begins earnestly, but gradually psychologically falls apart, experiencing a
complete breakdown in the third movement. However, in the last movement he
returns to stability, but in an altered state of reality, in a kind of
schizophrenic onstage-offstage dialogue with himself.
“When performing this work, I have to get into an
unstable, unpredictable mindset,” Eubank says. “I have to portray a character
that could ‘go off’ at any moment. Part of the challenge of Solus is making each character and each
musical gesture convincing to the audience. And at one point, I even have to
scream.”
The
concert is free; no tickets are required. Free parking is available in the
parking lot under the overpass on 7th Street across from the annex. The closest
Metro stations are the Washington Navy Yard (green line) and Eastern Market
(blue/orange/silver lines). The concert will also stream live on the Marine
Band website beginning at 2 p.m. EDT.
Complete program and notes
Directions and parking