Esprit Orchestra: X Marks The Spot

Alex Pauk, C.M. | Conductor

8:00PM Concert | 7:15PM Pre-concert talk with Alexina Louie

Anna Meredith (Scotland) Nautilus * (2011/21)
Arranged for orchestra by Jack Ross

* Canadian Premiere

Iannis Xenakis (Greece) Pour les Baleines (1986)

“For the Whales”

For string orchestra

György Ligeti (Hungary) Atmosphères (1961)

For large orchestra

R. Murray Schafer (Canada) Dream Rainbow Dream Thunder (1986)

Iannis Xenakis (Greece) Jonchaies (1977)

For 109 musicians

Exploring varied musical, physical and psychological environments, any one of which could be marked with an X as a destination worth visiting, this program moves from Meredith’s bold, highly energized Nautilus, derived from a stomp along a beach in Scotland, to Schafer’s depiction of the rain and mist shrouded Neuschwanstein, King Ludwig’s castle in the Bavarian mountains. As in Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey, Ligeti’s Atmosphères will transfix listeners in the timelessness and outer limits of Cosmic sound and silence. Using advanced mathematical calculations to generate forms and textures in music, Xenakis changed the direction of composition in the 20th century forever as can be experienced in the poetic expressions in two of his astounding works on this program.