The Black Pool
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for amplified soprano, mezzo-soprano, and chamber orchestra
date: 2017
duration: 12'
first performance: 2 June 2017; EMPAC, Rensselaer, NY; The Dogs of Desire; David Alan Miller, cond.
availability: rental | view perusal score
recording: non-commercial
detailed orchestration: amplified soprano and mezzo-soprano, 1(=pic).1.1(bcl).asx(=ssx).bsx.1 – 1.1.1.0 – dmkit – elec pf – 1.1.1.1.1(=ebgtr)
NOTES
In 2017, The Albany (NY) Symphony Orchestra invited me to write a piece for their annual American Music Festival. They requested I incorporate elements of rock music into the work, and since the festival was focused around celebrating the bicentennial of the Erie Canal, to somehow relate the piece to the transformative powers of water. The Black Pool is the result of that commission.
The text for the piece is essentially an allegory about finding freedom through confronting hard truths and fears. In the story, a young woman surreally discovers her doppelgänger lurking beneath the surface of a mysterious reflecting pool. After pondering her discovery, the "mirror of her shadows" lurking in the pool's murky depths pulls her in. Tumult and turmoil ensue.
The piece draws upon two specific and distinct influences. The first is the "Et in Unum Dominum" section of the Mass B Minor by J.S. Bach, which features 2 sopranos singing in semi-hocketing, imitative counterpoint with one another. This piece served as a model for the imitative "echo" counterpoint between The Black Pool's two vocalists, loosely suggesting the story's protagonist and antagonist.
Another direct source of influence is the contemporary musical artist Steven Wilson, who draws frequently from the rich legacy of "progressive rock," a particularly British subgenre of rock music which had its heyday in the late 1960s and early 70s. A variation on a riff from Wilson’s Remainder the Black Dog serves as a point of musing thematic departure and subsequent fantasy before emerging in full quotation during the extended instrumental interlude about halfway through the piece.
Progressive rock is notorious for fusing American rock and roll with the structural and harmonic devices of Western European classical music, and frequently features extended compositional structures, complex counterpoint, and astonishing instrumental and ensemble virtuosity.
At the same time progressive rock was developing in the U.K., similar transformations were happening in the U.S.A. Musicians were fusing R&B with horn-soaked arrangements reminiscent of big band-era jazz, while established jazz artists were transforming bebop and hard bop into "fusion" by blending elements of these styles with the propulsive rhythm of rock music. The iconoclastic Frank Zappa was also part of this transition, composing in an utterly unique style that can best be described as “avant chamber rock.”
It is in the spirit of these artists that The Black Pool was conceived. Subtitled a "prog rock cantata," the work pays homage to these and other intrepid artists who consciously push beyond established aesthetic philosophies and performance practices in an effort to advance the state of the art.