MICROSYMPH

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" In terms of musical importance -- which is to say the presentation of new music -- the evening was over 10 minutes after it began. Wolff brought Sebastian Currier's tiny but elegantly condensed "Microsymph" to the NSO for the first time. Currier has compressed a five-movement symphony into five well-wrought vignettes…..The Adagio is both well orchestrated and dramatically structured; it creates one of the important illusions of a good slow movement -- the suspension of time -- in a very brief period, with no excess or longueurs. Surrounding the Adagio is a coy little waltz, deftly rendered, in which the theme is barely heard twice; it is perhaps the best example of reductionism in the work. The fourth movement, a scherzo, is animated by rippling triplet figures and overlays of cross-rhythms that have a delightfully disorienting effect. The last movement quickly reprises the earlier ones and, like its predecessors, does so with astonishing concision.  Currier writes good music; one awaits a full-scale macrosymph from him with eagerness. Perhaps the NSO should commission one."

-Washington Post

                                                      Program Notes


Microsymph is a large-scale five movement symphony that has been squeezed into only ten minutes. The result is a frantically paced, restless, quick-changing kaleidoscope of five highly compressed movements which are built from a whirl of diverse materials into an eclectic amalgam of ceaselessly changing sounds, colors, and ideas.  The first movement, quickchange, is modeled on a sonata-form movement, but in a highly compressed form, where one idea races to the next.  The second movement, minute waltz, is as much about the minute as it is about the waltz.  In the movement there are two layers: one a musical representation of the inner workings of a clock, the other a waltz.  Though the third movement, adagio, is only four minutes long, it seems truly expansive within the context of the other movements. It is scored for strings, brass, and ringing pitched percussion.  The fourth movement, nanoscherzo, is composed of layering similar to the minute waltz and the last movement, kaleidoscope,  parodies the idea of a cyclic symphony where themes from previous movements return, here increasing the feeling of compressed time. Microsymph was written for and commissioned by the American Composers Orchestra and premiered at Carnegie Hall in December 1997.