Memorial Park
(2017)Program note
When writer Désanne van Brederode and I started thinking about a new requiem for November Music, we soon agreed that we wanted to do it differently. Our work should be about the dead and dying itself.
Désanne put it nicely: “I am concerned with species dying - anonymously and in loneliness, or in the depths of depression by her own hands, of drowning while fleeing, of grateful and conscious, after a long life, of desperate and furious and scared, because someone is suffering and had so many plans.”
As Désanne's beautiful lyrics came in one by one, I began to think more and more of Virgil Aeneas. He discovered how the main character enters the underworld: "Dark, under lonely night, be it the shadow." Ibant obscuri sola sub nocte per umbram. The writer paints a beautiful picture of his before and afterlife: a dark field, populated by all those wandering dead and as yet unborn souls. A kind of park populated by memories and promises. That's how I got the title Memorial Park.
From the wealth of poems Désanne wrote, I chose six texts that I set to music. For the connoisseurs: Although the poems bear the titles of the parts of the mass of the dead, in Memorial Park I don't quite follow the mention made - and even leave out parts. That is a freedom that I allowed myself: the form of the requiem was only a guide for our work.
The different characters of the poems and their subjects that are reflected in the music: Memorial Park is a work of intense contrasts, both in the characters of the parts and in the occupation - with a baroque string orchestra, a choir and an electric trio I greatly enhance the chiaroscuro.
The six sung parts and the three instrumental intermezzos are linked together: themes, instrumentation and characters change to each other, contained in one large circle. At the end we actually landed at the beginning again - an "ewige Wiederkehr des Gleichen."
Désanne put it nicely: “I am concerned with species dying - anonymously and in loneliness, or in the depths of depression by her own hands, of drowning while fleeing, of grateful and conscious, after a long life, of desperate and furious and scared, because someone is suffering and had so many plans.”
As Désanne's beautiful lyrics came in one by one, I began to think more and more of Virgil Aeneas. He discovered how the main character enters the underworld: "Dark, under lonely night, be it the shadow." Ibant obscuri sola sub nocte per umbram. The writer paints a beautiful picture of his before and afterlife: a dark field, populated by all those wandering dead and as yet unborn souls. A kind of park populated by memories and promises. That's how I got the title Memorial Park.
From the wealth of poems Désanne wrote, I chose six texts that I set to music. For the connoisseurs: Although the poems bear the titles of the parts of the mass of the dead, in Memorial Park I don't quite follow the mention made - and even leave out parts. That is a freedom that I allowed myself: the form of the requiem was only a guide for our work.
The different characters of the poems and their subjects that are reflected in the music: Memorial Park is a work of intense contrasts, both in the characters of the parts and in the occupation - with a baroque string orchestra, a choir and an electric trio I greatly enhance the chiaroscuro.
The six sung parts and the three instrumental intermezzos are linked together: themes, instrumentation and characters change to each other, contained in one large circle. At the end we actually landed at the beginning again - an "ewige Wiederkehr des Gleichen."
Scoring
Percussion (1 performer)
Electric Guitar
Bass Guitar
Mixed Chorus
Positive Organ
Strings
Electric Guitar
Bass Guitar
Mixed Chorus
Positive Organ
Strings
Duration
32'
More info
Libretto: Désanne van Brederode
Commissioned by November Music for Bosch Requiem 2017
Commissioned by November Music for Bosch Requiem 2017
First performance
2 November 2017 in Theater aan de Parade, ’s-Hertogenbosch by Nederlands Kamerkoor, Holland Baroque and TEMKO, conducted by Mathieu Romano
Sheet music
Available for rent/purchase from Deuss Music.