For symphony orchestra (3333, 4331, timp + 3 perc + pno + hp + strings) – 7:30 minutes
Commissioned by:
World Premiere: Grand Rapids Symphony, under John Varineau, Oct 4, 2014
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PROGRAM NOTE
In my latest orchestral work, Suspension, I explore the extremes of glissando and delay, with huge numbers of tiny canons employed in music that swirls with criss-crossing glissando, as the cables of bridges sustain both immense and complex tensions so that bridges can span incredible distances and the ravages of time to connect people and places.
SUSPENSION was inspired by the majestic bridges of my native New York City. Growing up in Queens, my psyche formed around New York’s many grand bridges, these mysterious goliaths that are at once splendid yet gritty, mighty yet rust-eaten, silent yet thundering, terrifying yet comforting. Each bridge has its own distinct character, and together they form the skeleton of my dreamscape version of New York, the beautifully dreary, grainy, mysterious, centuries-old nest of so much mobile humanity. Now, from my apartment in northern Manhattan I look out every day over the George Washington Bridge that spans the Hudson River, and I’ve grown to see these architectural marvels—with their miraculous distribution of weight, their mesmerizing lines, and their juxtaposition to their surrounding context—as some of the greatest works of art in my emerald city.
Price: $51
