Latest news

The latest…

…have been waiting to announce, and now I can, that I’ll have a new show on WRTI, on the HD2 side, all contemporary American music, we’re calling it Now is the Time, Sunday nights at 10, planning to get it on air the first Sunday in June, so much terrific stuff out there, having a blast getting these shows together, stay tuned…

I’ve finished the score for The Bremen Town Musicians for Auricolae (violin, cello, and David Yang, putting down his viola to be the irrepressible narrator), and it’ll be in front of school audiences in the Philadelphia area within the next few weeks; Auricolae means “little ears,” but you knew that…

The Crossing has commissioned me to write them an a cappella New Work for performance in the spring of 2009, on the haunting poetry of Paul Celan, which I’m just starting to get to know; can’t wait to work with Donald Nally and these wonderful singers again…

a recent hymn, O Lord, Our Lord, Your Excellent Name, my versification and setting of Psalm 8, has been selected for publication in the next Lutheran Forum, summer of 2008…

speaking of hymns, just tried out in choir rehearsal the newest collaboration with Rev. Michael Tavella, this for Pentecost Sunday, O Helper Spirit, You Are Here; this one is more chant-inspired, I believe, than my other hymns, the springboard being the words that end each verse: O Veni Sancte Spiritus;

here’s a look: and here’s a listen: …

on our 20 Apr Brassfest! (Jackie insisted on the “!”) for Rogation at church, 10-yr-old Martina played horn alongside the professionals (classmate Brendan also getting it done on trumpet); my arrangement—from, it seems, 85 years ago—of the Marcello Psalm 19 for the brass quintet pro’s made me smile since I’d forgotten about that one, Mike Franchetti was locked and loaded on 1st trumpet; much fun and many blessings at this service…

we’re hoping to make a commercial recording of Vespers this summer, “we” being the fantastic folks from Piffaro and The Crossing; have some editing to do and am adding another section near the end…

following up on our very successful project with David Kim, Paul Jones has asked me and other colleagues for some New Works for cello and piano this time, for Anne Martindale Williams, Principal Cello of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra; as with the violin/piano American Spirituals, I’m looking at hymns and spirituals; will have them completed late summer…

looking forward to the 200th anniversary of Lower Merion Baptist Church in Bryn Mawr, Pa., will have a New Work for that in September 2008, commemorating their founding in, yes, 1808; Jackie and I have fond memories of serving there as, respectively, organist and choir director in the early ’80s; hm, still have ties from back then—early ’80s, not 1808—not being one to quit on a garment so easily…

Reviews for Vespers…

Ecstatically beautiful • blessed with inspiration • thoroughly engaging • making ancient things modern is more common in Europe, but few such endeavors by Peteris Vasks, Giya Kancheli or Arvo Pärt have Smith’s lyrical immediacy and ability to find great musical variety while maintaining an overall coherent personality • assembled… with intelligence and originality • Breathtaking—David Patrick Stearns, Philadelphia Inquirer

One of the major events of the music season • Piffaro… took a big risk when it devoted an entire program to a commission by… one composer • Smith… produced the kind of success I hoped he’d give us • a sonic kaleidoscope… beautifully serene… rousing… exultant • Vespers is a triumph—Tom Purdom, Broad Street Review

Stunning • one of the finest concerts I’ve heard in at least the last decade • Smith’s choral writing… moves from start to finish in an unbroken arch of exposition, development and resolution that seems to unfold naturally before your eyes • the music envelops you and carries you • marvelous • a gem of a score • Masterful—Michael Caruso, Chestnut Hill Local

more from the reviews…

YouTube…

The beginning of Vespers on YouTube, “Veni Sancte Spiritus” and “Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern”:

There’s the encore of “Wie schön leuchtet” also on YouTube (this will get you there); over 4,100 hits on these altogether, I see. Thanks, DoN!

Calendar…

5 Jan 2008

Vespers for choir, soloists, and Renaissance band. Lutheran Church of the Holy Communion, Philadelphia. Piffaro, The Renaissance Band, Joan Kimball and Robert Wiemken, Artistic Directors, with professional chorus The Crossing, Donald Nally, Conductor. World premiere, commissioned by Piffaro with partial funding from the Philadelphia Music Project. Reviews… Program notes…

6 Jan 2008

Vespers. Piffaro, The Crossing, Presbyterian Church of Chestnut Hill, Philadelphia.

27 Jan 2008

Magnificat for SATB, handbells. Candlemas Vespers, Holy Trinity Lutheran Church, Abington, Pa.

4 Feb 2008

American Spirituals for violin and piano. Community Music School, 775 W Main St., Trappe, Pa. David Kim, violin, Concertmaster of the Philadelphia Orchestra, and Paul Jones, piano. Released on the CD The Lord is My Shepherd, David Kim, Paul Jones. Published by Paul Jones Music, edited and with fingerings and bowings by David Kim, in Sacred Music for Violin and Piano, The Lord is My Shepherd. More…

10 Feb 2008

American Spirituals. Church of the Good Samaritan, Paoli, Pa. David Kim, violin, Paul Jones, piano

15 Feb 2008

The Three Graces for oboe, horn, cello, piano, and double bass. Priscilla Smith, oboe, with Patrick Hines, horn, Rajli Bicolli, cello, Leon Boykins, double bass, and Jeremy Gill, piano. Originally for oboe, horn, cello, and string orchestra, this is the premiere of the chamber version. It’s still soloists with rhythm section… still no drum set. Rock Hall, Temple University, Philadelphia. Program notes…

23 Mar 2008

Psalm 19 (Marcello), arr. for orchestra. Central Baptist Church, Wayne, Pa.

12 Apr 2008

Spring and fall for voice and piano. Timothy Bentch tenor, Laura Ward piano. Lyric Fest, Presbyterian Church of Chestnut Hill, Philadelphia.

13 Apr 2008

Spring and fall. Timothy Bentch tenor, Laura Ward piano. Lyric Fest, First Presbyterian Church, Philadelphia

18 Apr 2008 (Fri) 3:40

Stationen aus dem Wege zur Freiheit for soprano, tenor saxophone, and piano, text by Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Soprano Charmaine Van Winkle, tenor saxophone Aaron Stewart, piano Jean-François Proulx. Rock Hall, Temple University, Philadelphia

26 Apr 2008

Three Dances for orchestra. Garden State Philharmonic, Anthony LaGruth, Strand Theater, Lakewood, N.J. Program notes…

9 May 2008. Philadelphia Orchestra/Rittenhouse Women’s Committee Lecture/Luncheon, Performance with early-music group Quidditas. Lecturing on Dalbavie La source d’un regard, Escaich Organ Concerto No. 1, Prokofiev Symphony No. 5

15 May 2008 (Thu) 7:30

Holy Mountain and Come, Ye Sinners for voices and piano. The Phoenix Quartet, Dorot, 171 W. 85 St, New York, N.Y. Sponsored by The Bard Graduate Center for Studies in the Decorative Arts, Design and Culture, “Simple Gifts: Tracing the Shaker Influence”

16, 17, 18 May 2007. Quidditas concerts, First Baptist Church Collingswood N.J., Chestnut Hill Friends Meeting House, Byberry Friends Meeting House

May 2008–2009

The Bremen Town Musicians for violin, cello, and narrator. Commissioned by Strings for Schools for Auricolae, David Yang, Music Director, for performances 2008-2009. With funding from the American Composers Forum, Community Partners.

31 May 2008 (Sat) noon

Holy Mountain and Come, Ye Sinners for voices and piano. The Phoenix Quartet, Dorot, 171 W. 85 St, New York, N.Y. Sponsored by The Bard Graduate Center for Studies in the Decorative Arts, Design and Culture, also, making an oval box 1:00–4:30

Summer 2008

O Lord, Our Lord, Your Excellent Name, hymn. Published in Lutheran Forum

14 Sep 2008

New Work. 200th Anniversary of Lower Merion Baptist Church, Bryn Mawr, Pa.

Fall 2008

New Works for cello and piano. Anne Martindale Williams, Principal Cello, Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, recording and performances with Paul Jones

Spring 2009

New Work. For The Crossing

Photos of Kile by Mark Garvin

I’ve included mp3’s, whenever I have them and can use them, next to the titles on the Orchestral, Chamber, and Church music pages. They’re also grouped together on the Listen page.

About the photo. It’s John Wesley Pinckney (1861–1919), a great-grandfather of Jackie’s, in, we think, Nebraska or Iowa. The “Grandpa Pinckney” written along the bottom looks to be the handwriting of Jackie’s maternal grandmother, Lillian Fay Buckley Pinckney, perhaps as a keepsake for her daughter Violet? Lillian married John Joseph Pinckney, John Wesley’s son. I was fortunate to meet John (Joseph) and Lillian in 1977 at their farm in Smyrna, N.Y., where he had raised Red Polls. This was two years before Jackie and I were married. This was also the same day I first met Aunt Violet, Uncle LeRoy (“That’s what they teach you in college, to put your coat on to walk from the car to the house?”: his very first words to me), and cousin Dale Goodrich, over at their dairy farm not too far away in Sherburne. OK, so why is this photo here?

It’s simply my favorite picture. It encapsulates the virtue of staying with it, of getting rid of dead wood, and it looks exactly like composing (or at least orchestrating) to me. In this wash of a snapshot, the left foot is just about to alight, the right arm is slightly akimbo, just enough to balance the load on that broad Scottish shoulder. To the left, the merest hint of a simple clapboard house. The photo is taken just as he clears the out-buildings, the log framing them above, and a step or two before the front of the log would be hidden. That log is stunningly parallel with what looks to be a garden-border on the ground. He is left of center, driving the motion out of the frame, but amazingly, the log is perfectly centered between the right and left borders of the picture, cut off bluntly in front, trailing a dramatically decaying comet’s wake behind. He not only bears his burden but is obscured by it, as he and it make the sign of the cross. I am transfixed by this photo, this one-in-a-million shot.