George crumb dies11/24/2023 ![]() ![]() A recording of the work, one of his few forays into orchestral repertory, won a Grammy in 2001.Ĭrumbs fascination with Federico García Lorca led to other major works. 4, multiple conductors preside over Crumbs Star-Child (1977), a major work set to Latin texts for soprano, solo trombone, childrens choir and large orchestra. Practicality usually wasnt one of his primary concerns, however. He used various extended techniques, like strumming the piano strings with a paper clip, to create eerie sonorities.Įach movement of his orchestral piece ∾choes of Time and the River (awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1968) features processionals in which small groups of musicians move around the stage in patterns and directions specified in the score requirements Crumb later acknowledged were rather impractical. The performers wear black half-masks Crumb also specified that (where possible) the performance take place under blue lighting. A recording of whale songs made by a marine scientist inspired his Vox Balaenae (Voice of the Whale) for electric flute, cello and amplified piano (1971). Other pieces were equally theatrical and sometimes featured ritualistic elements. The piece has since entered the repertory and been championed by prominent ensembles like the Kronos Quartet. And I ended up conducting, can you imagine? I felt like a fool conducting a string quartet, but it helped them keep it all together. In 2014 Crumb, who guided their first performance, said: They hadnt played much contemporary music, so they were willing to do anything I wanted. The members of the Stanley Quartet, which premiered the work in 1970, were baffled by some of the unusual requirements and not necessarily happy to play them. The grimly claustrophobic music of the first movement, Threnody I: Night of the Electric Insects, was deemed sufficiently scary to be used on the soundtrack for the horror film The Exorcist.Ĭrumb described the piece as a kind of parable on our troubled contemporary world. A mournful fragment from Schuberts ∽eath and the Maiden string quartet is interrupted by fierce bow strokes and human shouts. It is scored for an amplified string quartet and features techniques such as tapping the strings with thimbles. ∻lack Angels (1970), one of Crumbs best-known works and a reaction to the Vietnam War, was an early example of his imaginative eclecticism. The apocalypse itself seemed to be evoked in the new Kronos-Kryptos piece, whose third movement has four bass drums going full tilt at the same time, critic David Patrick Stearns wrote in The Philadelphia Inquirer. His 90th birthday was celebrated by organizations including the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, which presented the premiere of a new piece for percussion quintet. While rejecting the sometimes arid 12-tone technique of modernists, Crumb beguiled audiences with his own musical language, composing colorful and concise works that range in mood from peaceful to nightmarish. His death was announced by Bridge Records, his record label. ![]() George Crumb, a composer who filled his works with a magpie array of instrumental and human sounds and drew on the traditions of Asia and his native Appalachia to create music of startling effect, died Sunday at his home in Media, Pennsylvania. Come, journey into the black of the night.NEW YORK, NY. This is not music for the faint of heart. The set is completed by Edmund Finnis’ transcendent 2nd string quartet and Gabriella Smith’s fast and furious ‘Carrot Revolution’. Elsewhere, the Collective present a brand-new commission by hip-hop artist, activist, poet and composer Camae Ayewa (Moor Mother). Themes of death, destiny and obsessive spirituality prevail in Crumb’s avant-garde masterpiece – performed here alongside ‘Death and the Maiden’ by Schubert. Musicians are instructed to chant in foreign languages, play their instruments upside down, incessantly tap the strings with thimbles and glass rods, scream, shout, beat, count and pray. The notoriously difficult piece makes extraordinary demands of any string quartet who dare to attempt it. Subtitled ‘Thirteen Images from the Dark Land’, it’s a cult work for a reason – once you hear it, you’ll never forget it. George Crumb’s ‘Black Angels’ is about as close as you’ll get to an acid trip without breaking the law.
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