picc.2.2.1+bcl.1/sop sax (or cl).alto sax (or cl)/0.3.1.0/timp(optional double on 3trgl).4perc./piano.harp./str
*In the case where saxophone players are not available, those parts can be played on Bb clarinets. There is only one score and one set of parts which incorporates all versions. For example, in the individual parts, whenever there is a soprano saxophone cue it is marked "S. Sax (or Cl.2.)” In the set of parts from the publisher, clarinet #2 and #3 parts are labeled as parts #9a and #10a while the saxophone parts are labeled as parts #9 and #10.
Commissioned by the New York Philharmonic.
Dedicated with admiration and gratitude to The New York Philharmonic and Ken-David Masur.
First performance by the New York Philharmonic, Ken-David Masur conducting, at Lincoln Center in the Wu Tsai Theater of the David Geffen Hall, New York, NY, on 19 September, 2024.
Duration: 8 minutes and 30 seconds
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“A kaleidoscope is an optical instrument with two or more reflecting surfaces (or mirrors) tilted to each other at an angle, so that one or more (parts of) objects on one end of these mirrors are shown as a regular symmetrical pattern when viewed from the other end, due to repeated reflection. These reflectors are usually enclosed in a tube, often containing on one end a cell with loose, colored pieces of glass or other transparent (and/or opaque) materials to be reflected into the viewed pattern. Rotation of the cell causes motion of the materials, resulting in an ever-changing view being presented.”
— Wikipedia
One central metaphor of my life’s creative work is that of light refracting. Of interest to me, for my work, is to build, sculpt, and compose clean, clear, transparent, translucent, luminous, radiant, shining, resounding, and resonant musical materials.
The sonic image I had when composing this nine-minute work was that of a kaleidoscope refracting light with the kaleidoscope’s vibrant and multi-shaped materials being rotated four times, resulting in five ever-changing bebop dances which are played without pause. The orchestra is a virtuosic kaleidoscope. Bebop Kaleidoscope, Homage to Duke Ellington unfolds a labyrinth of musical interrelationships and connections that showcase the world-class musicians of the New York Philharmonic and conductor Ken-David Masur. Here is a virtuosic display of rhythmic and timbral dexterity, counterpoint, skill, energy, dynamic and articulative range, precision, and teamwork. When feasible, the composition is to be performed with dancers.
Organic and at every level concerned with transformations and connections, the carefully sculpted musical materials are agile and spirited. Their flexibility allows pathways to braid harmonic, rhythmic, timbral, and contrapuntal elements which are constantly transformed — sometimes whimsical and light, sometimes jazzy, sometimes almost balletic, sometimes vaguely akin to lively and spirited music on a caffeine rush, sometimes layered and reverberating with overtly cantabile, melodic resonance, pirouettes, fulcrum points, and effervescence.
Although my music is meticulously notated in every detail, I like it to sound like it was being spontaneously invented – always in the act of becoming. I have a vivid sense that the process of the creative journey (rather than a predictable fixed point of arrival) is, for me, essential.
I dance while I compose, hoping that my music will feel organic and self-propelled. I work hard to ensure that my music too dances; I often create in my mind and ear imaginary flexible dances and ballets, poems, visual art doodles, lighting, or animations, and I love virtuosic performances that percolate and spiral with natural musicality.
Made as an homage to Duke Ellington, Bebop Kaleidoscope celebrates the imagination, joy, love, swing, soul, energy, great chords (as if he had seven fingers on each hand!), rich chord progressions, tight big-band-splash-chords, the use of brass mutes, the highlighting of soloists within the band, and the sheer beating-heart-inner-life of the music.
Music for me is an embrace of the world, a way to open myself to being alive in the world — in my body, in my sounds, and in my mind. I yearn to reflect in my own singing and composing the ways that listening has changed me. I write music that craves a listener — whomever that listener may be — and I am concerned with speaking honestly. I care deeply about musicality, imagination, craft, clarity, dimensionality, an elegant balance between material and form, and empathy with the performing musicians as well as everyone who works in the presenting organizations.
It is difficult to express how grateful I am to the many extraordinary colleagues who have made possible this commission and world premiere. Thank you all!
Music’s eternal quality is its capacity for change, transformation, and renewal. No one composer, musical style, school of thought, technical practice, culture, or historical period can claim a monopoly on music’s truths. I believe music feeds our souls. Unbreakable is the power of art to build community. Humanity has and will always work together to further music’s flexible, diverse capacity and innate power.
Dedicated with admiration and gratitude to The New York Philharmonic and Ken-David Masur
Bebop Kaleidoscope – Homage to Duke Ellington (2024) Augusta Read Thomas (1964)
Susan Stempleski, The Classical Source, September 21, 2024 "Opening with a fusillade of forceful chords, August Read Thomas’s 2024 Bebop Kaleidoscope, a nine-minute tribute to ‘Duke Ellington’, delivered a constantly shifting pattern of short, sharply accented sounds, ranging from big-band riffs to more lyrical duos, trios and fanfares. The capricious, carefully layered score is not a jazz number per se, but an evocation of the kinetic energy of the bebop era, a work fizzing with life and color, constantly evolving and searching."
George Grella, New York Classical Review, September 20, 2024
The world premiere of August Read Thomas’ Bebop Kaleidoscope—Homage to Duke Ellington.
"Thomas’s piece had the feeling of a long prelude, a loping series of short, rhythmically tricky, sharply accented phrases, digging downward before the next one bounced backed up. It was a skillful, imaginative atomizing of bebop phraseology, structured in a way that the music seemed to be in the constant process of becoming something else…fascinating, and the bright, metallic colors of the orchestration were stimulating, the energy propulsive."
To obtain examination or performance material for this
Augusta Read Thomas work, please contact Nimbus Music Publishing.
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