John Sampen

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Publication Date

3-30-2006

Year of Release

2006

Note(s)

Spring Tour 2006

Duquesne University, West Virginia University,

Morehead State University,

Marshall University, Ohio University

This performance supported in part by the Conn-Selmer Company and by Bowling Green State University

Program Notes

Pauline Oliveros (b.1932) helped change the course of American music through her work in improvisation, electronic techniques, teaching methods, myth and ritual, and meditative and physical-consciousness. She is founder and director of the Deep Listening ™ program for the Oliveros Foundation and has developed a compositional style which typically emphasizes attention strategies, musicianship and improvisational skills. Her SAXUAL ORIENTATION was written in 1998 for the Rova Saxophone Quartet and features an improvised melody line with choices of verbal instructions including a star shaped musical map.

MYSTERIOUS MORNING II exploits the use of bisbigliando ('whispering'), a harp technique favored by composer Fuminori Tanada (b.1961) in his cycle of "Mysterious Morning" works. Commissioned by the Habanera Quartet, the two pieces of MYSTERIOUS MORNING II explore sound from within, with its micro intervals, vibrato of intensity or glissando, and multiphonics. The unusual relief produced by these waves of sound creates a different perception of time, which is suspended, despite the density of the individual lines: the resulting music is both fluid and unstable, constantly enriched by infinite changes of timbre, and within it we perceive an object that is a more or less motionless, remaining the same while constantly changing in appearance (excerpts of MYSTERIOUS MORNING II notes by Alain Poirier)

In 1975, Karlheinz Stockhausen (b.1928) composed 12 melodies for the work ''Musik Im Bauch" ("Music in the Belly"), one for each sign of the zodiac. This was eventually retitled TIERKREIS. Karlheinz Stockhausen writes that ''I began to busy myself with the 12 human characters of the Zodiac of which I had until then only a vague idea. In inventing each melody I thought of the characters of children, friends, and acquaintances who were born under the various star signs, and I studied the human types of the star signs more thoroughly. Each melody is now composed with all its measures and proportions in keeping with the characteristics of its respective star sign, and one will discover many legitimacies when one hears a melody often, and exactly contemplates its construction."

Marilyn Shrude's (b.1946) EVOLUTION V for Solo Alto Saxophone and Saxophone Quartet (SATB) was written for John Sampen and the Chicago Saxophone Quartet (Robert Black, Richard Kennell, Walker Smith and James Kasprzyk) and premiered by them at the 5th World Saxophone Congress in London, England (1976). Shrude's unique instrumental ensemble is designed for the university saxophone teacher virtuosic, concerto-like proportions for the soloist against a challenging, highly technical quartet accompaniment. The melodic material is a free rendering of a serialized fifteen-note row; rhythm is both strictly metered and more loosely structured in controlled aleatoric gestures.

Recognized as one of the architects of minimalist music, Philip Glass (b.1937) studied composition with Milhaud, Persichetti and Boulanger. He is founder and director of the Philip Glass Ensemble (established 1968) and has been honored with distinguished awards including Musical America's Musician of the Year (1985). His monumental film scores and dramas include ''Einstein on the Beach", "Koyaanisaatsi" and "Akhnaten". FACADES was written in 1981 to be played by either two soprano saxophones or two flutes and strings. It was originally intended as a visual montage of Wall Street in New York City on a Sunday morning. Sampen, and Muncy arranged this setting for five saxophones.

Franco Donatoni (1927-2000) is one of the most influential Italian composers of his generation. Written in 1990 on a commission from the Austrian Radio, RASCH, with its Latin poetic manner, develops a rhythmic scheme, dense but airy. The work starts with a murmur of percussive sounds, then follows a simple dynamic curve towards a powerful homorythmic section, with blocks of trills and staccati groups, before returning to silence. The title of the piece ("fast" in German) is a hint to the Rascher Saxophone quartet to whom the work is dedicated, but also refers to the unusual tempo indication of 111 in the score (pure orientation value according to the composer). (RASCH program notes by Pierre-Stephane Meuge)

Ivan Fedele (b.1953) is a prominent and prolific Italian composer with major works for orchestra, stage, choral and chamber musicians. He originally majored in philosophy at the Universita degli Studi (Milan) and later completed his music studies in1981 at the Conservatorio G.Verdi (Milan) after working with composer Azio Corghi. His other primary teacher was Franco Donatoni (Rome). MAGIC was written for the Rascher Saxophone Quartet in 1985 and premiered the following year by this ensemble in Germany. Fedele's score requires, virtuosic musicians to realize the many technical demands and complicated irrational rhythms

BIOGRAPIDES

The NAHONO SAXOPHONE QUARTET of Bowling Green State University is comprised of four talented award-winning student artists. Ryan Munty (soprano) was a Fulbright Scholar in France (2003-2004) and has recently won the Lima Symphony Competition and Honorable Mention in the William Byrd Solo Competition. Jeff Heisler (alto) and Christopher Chmielewski (baritone) were former members of the BGSU Blue Square Saxophone Quartet who won the Gold Medal (2005) for the National Fischoff Chamber Music Competition and 3rd Prize (2005) in the MTNA National Chamber Music Competition. David Wegehaupt (tenor) was a BGSU concerto finalist and serves as music director of the BGSU college radio station. Their quartet title "Nahono" is an Arabic term which, in English, translates as the word "we", suggesting the bonding of four disparate forces into one cohesive musical unit.

Internationally-recognized saxophonist John Sampen is dedicated to the promotion and performance of contemporary art music. His sponsorship of new music has resulted in premieres of over eighty works, including commissions by Rands, Subotnick, Cage, Adler, and Babbitt. Sampen has also presented first performances of saxophone arrangements by Lutoslawski, Stockhausen and Tower.

John Sampen's world-wide performances include concerts with the Numberg Symphony, the Biel Swiss Symphony, the Osaka Municipal Winds, the Toledo Symphony, the Orchestra Intemazionale d'Italy and the New Mexico Symphony. He has recorded with the Belgian and Swiss National Radio as well as the Capstone CRI, Neuma and Orion labels. A clinician for the Selmer Company, Sampen has presented master classes at important universities and conservatories in Asia, Europe and North America. Dr. Sampen is presently Distinguished Artist Professor at Bowling Green State University and president of the North American Saxophone Alliance.

Award-winning composer/pianist Marilyn Shrude is an active proponent of contemporary music in America. Her honors include the Kennedy Center Friedheim Awards for Orchestral Music, the Cleveland Arts Prize, Alverno College Alumna of the Year, and a recent Rockefeller Foundation residency in Italy. Shrude's compositions are performed internationally in Prague's Smetana Hall, Taiwan's National Concert Hall, Brussels Town Hall, Carnegie Recital Hall, Merkin Hall, and the Kennedy Center.

Dr. Shrude is founder of the MidAmerican Center for Contemporary Music and was director of the nationally-acclaimed BGSU New Music & Art Festival for 19 years. She served as chair of the Theory and Composition Department at Interlochen Arts Camp and was a visiting faculty member at Indiana University. She is currently professor and chair of the Musicology/Composition/Theory Department at Bowling Green State University. Shrude has performed as collaborative pianist with John Sampen since 1972.

Note

Smith Recital Hall

Marshall University Music Department Presents The Nahono Saxophone Quartet, from, Bowling Green State University, with, Dr. John Sampen

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