Official site of composer Andrea Clearfield. Biography, list of works with audio, score samples, reviews and program notes, photographs, upcoming performances.
Scored for: SATB chorus and string quartet, also arranged for vocal quartet with piano, or string quartet Text: Rhina Espaillat Language: English Duration: 8:20 min. Premiere: 8/16/12 Candlelight Chorale, Jay Lane, Artistic Director with Irina Muresanu and Cyrus Beroukhim, violins, David Yang, viola and Caroline Stinson, cello Commissioned by: The Newburyport Chamber Music Festival Published by: Self-published, Angelfire Press
Contact Andrea Clearfield for score and parts:
NOTES
“Three Tenses of Light” was inspired by the evocative poetry of Rhina P. Espaillat on the passage of the sun, the colorful, luminescent paintings of Andrew Anderson-Bell and the images in my mind’s eye of the rising and falling light over meadows and marshes, together creating an homage to the circular ritual of beginnings and endings of the day and in our lives. The music begins with a simple descending and ascending two-note motive that gives way to sounds reminiscent of nature. The motive develops into longer rising and falling melodies that are propelled from the day’s beginning into music of bright emotional intensity at afternoon’s peak, lingering momentarily and then fading into darker harmonies as day retreats; the piece is formed into a large arc shape with a coda on the words “light’s benediction”. This work was conceived at the Rockefeller’s Bellagio Center, Lake Como, Italy where sublime views offered constantly changing light on water. With gratitude to the Rockefeller Foundation and the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts for providing ideal time and space to compose this work.
LISTEN
Painting by Andrew Anderson Bell
TEXT
Three Tenses of Light
for Andrew Anderson-Bell
Sky, meadow and marsh:
a trinity of waters,
three tenses of light.
Tattered horizon,
the far fringes of morning
where new light rises:
Daylight advancing,
igniting sudden loosestrife,
taking the meadow.
Cloud blue flecked with sun:
noon wavering, gold water
fringed with black grasses.
Nothing here to cast
shade, measure the afternoon’s
retreat, its fading
fall into darkness
over marsh and meadow. Sky,
you patient watcher
of all creation,
bend to the sleeping water,
embrace it wholly
through the dark hours,
then rise to bring us, again,
light’s benediction.
Three Tenses of Light
Three Tenses of Light
Scored for: SATB chorus and string quartet, also arranged for vocal quartet with piano, or string quartet
Text: Rhina Espaillat
Language: English
Duration: 8:20 min.
Premiere: 8/16/12 Candlelight Chorale, Jay Lane, Artistic Director with Irina Muresanu and Cyrus Beroukhim, violins, David Yang, viola and Caroline Stinson, cello
Commissioned by: The Newburyport Chamber Music Festival
Published by: Self-published, Angelfire Press
Contact Andrea Clearfield for score and parts:
NOTES
“Three Tenses of Light” was inspired by the evocative poetry of Rhina P. Espaillat on the passage of the sun, the colorful, luminescent paintings of Andrew Anderson-Bell and the images in my mind’s eye of the rising and falling light over meadows and marshes, together creating an homage to the circular ritual of beginnings and endings of the day and in our lives. The music begins with a simple descending and ascending two-note motive that gives way to sounds reminiscent of nature. The motive develops into longer rising and falling melodies that are propelled from the day’s beginning into music of bright emotional intensity at afternoon’s peak, lingering momentarily and then fading into darker harmonies as day retreats; the piece is formed into a large arc shape with a coda on the words “light’s benediction”. This work was conceived at the Rockefeller’s Bellagio Center, Lake Como, Italy where sublime views offered constantly changing light on water. With gratitude to the Rockefeller Foundation and the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts for providing ideal time and space to compose this work.
LISTEN
Painting by Andrew Anderson Bell
TEXT
Three Tenses of Light
for Andrew Anderson-Bell
Sky, meadow and marsh:
a trinity of waters,
three tenses of light.
Tattered horizon,
the far fringes of morning
where new light rises:
Daylight advancing,
igniting sudden loosestrife,
taking the meadow.
Cloud blue flecked with sun:
noon wavering, gold water
fringed with black grasses.
Nothing here to cast
shade, measure the afternoon’s
retreat, its fading
fall into darkness
over marsh and meadow. Sky,
you patient watcher
of all creation,
bend to the sleeping water,
embrace it wholly
through the dark hours,
then rise to bring us, again,
light’s benediction.
Rhina P. Espaillat