Output details

Angels and Fireflies ( tone-poem for flute/recorder soloist with string orchestra)

Angels and Fireflies. Tone-poem for flute or recorder with string orchestra, 2011. Duration 13'. Performance/recording/score ii+63pp. Premiere Wait Chapel, Wake Forest University, North Carolina, USA 11/9/2011 by professional musicians from the Piedmont Triad orchestras of North Carolina, Woodson E. Faulkner II conductor, Tadeu Coelho flautist; additional premiere venue was Imperial War Museum North, Manchester via trans-Atlantic internet broadcast in 45-minute programme, devised by Malone, commemorating the tenth anniversary of 9/11 and launching IWMN's year-long exhibition "In the Spotlight: Remembering 9/11" with Sir Howard Bernstein (Manchester City Council CEO). Further performances: 10/3/2012 Manchester University String Orchestra, John Turner recorderist; "Premieres of the Season" Festival Kiev 31/5/2013, Kyiv Camerata, Valery Matyuhin conductor, Bogdan Stelmashenko flautist, National Union of Composers Concert Hall. Issued on Metiér MSV92106 and MSV28543 (both versions).

This research asks the question: How might an inexplicable, personal event -- a host of fireflies over a crash site -- resonate meaning to the general public? (See score programme note.) Research into personal, transcendental symphonic tone-poems by Ives (e.g. Holidays "Symphony" and Three Places in New England) revealed small- and large-scale tableaux-style structures with juxtaposed personal, public and transcendental topoi in different strata enabling different yet complementary experiences for listeners. "Angels and Fireflies" concentrate these results into four contiguous tableaux: Mountain, Fireflies, Angels, and The Transambiguation of the Evening. To aid listeners' personal involvement, some of whom noticeably wept during the premiere, various portals invoking nostalgia and familiarity were explored: quotation (Willis' “It Came Upon a Midnight Clear” which sets Sears' lyrics about angels; Ives' The Unanswered Question), stylistic allusions (Ruggles' Men and Mountains and "Angels") and comfort through familiarity with glimpses of tonal artefacts, occasionally superimposed bitonally which serves as a secondary stratum in the harmonic structure.