Speaker: Grace Ann (Jung Yoon) Lee Masters Candidate Thesis Defense Department: Shepherd School of Music Location: Alice Pratt Brown Hall 1405
The inspiration behind the piece, “Emerald Nigh Sky” is the Northern Lights in Alaska. The piece is driven by two contrasting imageries. The first is the bombastic excitement one feels when encountering the intense, strongly luminous Aurora for the first time. The second is the calmness and the static feature of the celestial, wondrous green lights in sky. The work is organized in the overall A-B-A form. The beginning of the A is characterized by the rising motion in the strings, piano, and vibraphones with a huge chord in the full ensemble accenting the highest pitch, quickly followed by the fast busy 16ths in the strings. Further into the A, the playful rhythms, abrupt interruptions of glissandos in strings and the trombones, and the beginning motivic ideas drive the piece forward as the section reaches a huge rising motion to a big chord at the end that blends into the B section. The B section, marked in a slower tempo, contrasts to the A with a static pedal tone of the concert pitch ‘A’ hovering around the ensemble. The fast gestures in Vibraphone, Harp, and the Piano paired with the upper woodwinds enter spontaneously highlighting the magical feature of the northern green lights. In midst of these textures, a solo cello and a solo Bass Clarinet enters in a conversational tone. The B section ends with the repetitive contrapuntal sequences in Vibraphone, Harp, Piano as the rest of the ensemble fade out slowly after holding out a long chord. The final A section comes back with the faster tempo with high energy. The piece ventures out once more with the beginning motivic ideas. After developments of these ideas the ensemble reaches the final grand finale with a huge rise in the ensemble reaching a giant chord signaling the end. (Department : Shepherd School of Music)
