May 17, 2013 - 8:00pm

Atlas Performing Arts Center
1333 H Street NE
Washington, D.C.

Great Noise Ensemble concludes its 2012-2013 season with a final performance as New Music Ensemble-in-Residence at Atlas Performing Arts Center, presenting a program about changes, human urges and the dreams for peace of mind and stability which we all share. Revolution again features the members of hexaCollective along with Great Noise Ensemble in Shawn Jaeger’s Poor and Wretched, Sean Doyle’s Letters From Zelda, and Daniel Felsenfeld’s Revolutions of Ruin.

Shawn Jaeger’s Poor and Wretched pays homage to one of Jaeger’s great musical loves: the lined-out hymnody of the Old Regular Baptists of central Appalachia. “Old Regular hymnals contain words only,” say Jaeger, “and so the tunes are transmitted orally. Lining-out is essentially a mnemonic device. The leader of a hymn sings each line first by himself, to a syllabic melody. Immediately thereafter, the entire congregation repeats the line, answering the leader with a very melismatic, extended version of his melody. Furthermore, each member of the congregation sings the melody a little differently, resulting in a highly heterophonic texture. Some hold particular notes just a little bit longer than others, some add flourishes and decorations, some project vowels against the hard palate in the characteristic mountain style. All sing at the very top of their lungs. Without directly quoting any material, I sought, in the piece, to pay tribute to the complexity, the rawness, and the honesty of the Old Regulars and their music.”

In Letters from Zelda, Sean Doyle sets texts sets texts of letters written to F. Scott Fitzgerald by his wife Zelda to lush orchestrations that evoke the jazz age and the dramatic swings of Zelda’s mental instability. “The letters reflect the unique sentiments of an intense, estranged relationship, says Doyle. “They also display Zelda’s often-overlooked talent for words, as the text of each letter captures with beauty and poetry the bicameral personality of this remarkable woman – completely free-spirited and independent, and yet at the same time so vulnerable and dependent upon the attention and sympathy of her husband. The musical setting seeks to create the environment of both her energetic musings and melancholy recollections.”

Daniel Felsenfeld’s Revolutions of Ruin is what the composer terms a “road oratorio,” setting the words of Rick Moody, Michael Chabon, Tara Bray Smith and Mark Z. Danielewski into a set of songs about the “adolescent wanderlust that thrives so deeply in the American consciousness.” Felsenfeld describes the work as touching “many locales—Hawaii, Pittsburgh, Los Angeles—before settling, in the (for lack of a better word) epic final movement on the place that is to be found within, the territory not the map.”

About The Program:
Shawn Jaeger: Poor And Wretched
Sean Doyle: Letters From Zelda
Daniel Felsenfeld: Revolutions Of Ruin

This performance will be presented in Atlas Performing Art Center’s Lang Theater, in the heart of D.C.’s H Street Arts District.

Tickets are $25 General and $15 Students with I.D., and are available though the Atlas Performing Arts Center website and at the box office (202.399.7993)

Information and Directions To Atlas Performing Arts Center

On April 5th, 2012, Great Noise Ensemble returns to the Atlas Performing Arts Center for Revelation, a program of music dealing with mysteries revealed, be they organizational, physical or mystical and individuals against a crowd.

On April 4, 2012, Great Noise Ensemble will present Stephen Albert’s Treestone at the Kennedy Center Millennium Stage, serving as a precursor to the National Symphony Orchestra’s performance of Albert’s Rivering Waters later in the evening in the Kennedy Center Concert Hall.

Great Noise Ensemble returns to the Intersections Festival at Atlas Performing Arts Center with a program centered on evoking traditions and events, including Mark Sylvester’s Banjo Concerto and Ted Hearne’s Katrina Ballads.