April 21, 1997

UCSC honors composer Lou Harrison with special 80th birthday concert

By Sabrina Eastwood

CONCERT:
Wednesday, April 23 at 8 p.m.
Advance tickets: $8 general, $5 seniors, $3 students w/ ID

Music Center Recital Hall, UC Santa Cruz
Info: UCSC Ticket Office, 408/459-2159
Sponsor: UCSC Music Department

The UCSC Music Department is honored to present a special concert performance in celebration of the 80th birthday of prominent American composer and longtime Aptos resident Lou Harrison. The concert will feature a number of well-known musicians from the Monterey and San Francisco Bay Areas performing an array of solo and chamber works from HarrisonÕs varied and vital career. (See below for complete program.) Harrison will be in attendance at this special concert, and the audience is invited to share some birthday cake at an informal reception after the performance.

About Lou Harrison

Lou Harrison was born in Portland, Oregon on May 14, 1917. At the age of nine he moved to the San Francisco Bay Area where he has spent the major part of his life. In the 1930s and early 40s, he worked with modern dancers Carols Beals, Bonnie Bird, Bella Lewitsky, and Lester Horton, and studied with composer Henry Cowell. CowellÕs course, ŌMusic of the Peoples of the World,Ķ served as a major stimulus for HarrisonÕs research into non-Western musical repertories.

With CowellÕs encouragement, Harrison began to seek out alternative sound-producing media such as brake drums, clay flower pots, and metal pipes as well as instruments from other cultures. Together with John Cage, whom he met in 1938, Harrison staged annual concerts of percussion ensemble music in San Francisco and at Mills College in Oakland.

In 1942 Harrison spent a year in Los Angeles during which time he studied with Arnold Schoenberg. In 1943, he relocated to New York where he would remain for the next ten years.

After Harrison returned to California in 1953 (settling in Aptos), Asian influences in his music became more and more pronounced. In a number of works, he has combined Western and Eastern orchestral ensembles--including the Indonesian gamelan ensemble which has been a prominent feature in many of his works.

Program:

Three Songs by Lou Harrison

GretchenÕs Spinning Song from Faust (1985)

May Rain (1941)

Air from the opera Rapunzel (1952)

Suite from the ballet Solstice (1950)

Part 1:

Garden of the Sun

Entrance of the Moon Bull

Battle

EarthÕs Invitation

Vernal Dance

Part 2:

Saturnalia

Rekindling of the Fire

Turning of the Wheel

Blaze of Day

Intermission

Suite for Cello and Piano (1995)

Moderato

Elegy

Allegro

Three pieces for piano

Changing Moment (1946)

A 12-Tone Morning After to Amuse Henry [Cowell] (ca. 1944-45)

TandyÕs Tango (1992)

Simfony #13 (1941)

The UCSC Percussion Ensemble:
Kristine Carelli
Emerson DuBois
Jaime Heilpern
Ann Yoshikawa
William Winant, conductor

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