It’s a brand-new concert season, and with it comes new releases and works from Jenni Brandon! Check out these works and the rest of the Jenni Brandon Music catalogue, from chamber to orchestra, choral to opera, for your upcoming 2022-2023 season.
At Night for Clarinet Choir (4 Clarinets in B-flat and 2 Bass Clarinets) is inspired by the poem At Night by Amy Lowell used for inspiration in both speaks of the wind singing through the trees and the excitement of the wild wind. Arranged for Clarinet Choir by Sheila Cullen.
The Mountain for two clarinets in B-flat is inspired by the poem “My Help is in the Mountain” by Nancy Wood. This work describes going to the mountain to find healing, to draw inspiration from the rocks and streams, and to become one with all of the land, finding strength from nature and from within.
Tempestas for Clarinet (B-flat and Bass) and Keyboard Percussion (Vibraphone, Crotales, Glockenspiel, Marimba) is inspired by the beautiful mural Ocean Over Kansas by Brian Timmer (www.briantimmerart.com)This painting shows a large, scary storm rolling in over a beautiful and expansive field in Kansas and gives a clear picture of the power of these massive storms. Tempestas which is the Latin word meaning “season, weather, bad weather, storm” was also know in Roman times as the goddess of storms or sudden weather. This embodiment of an ancient description is so relative today with daily reminders that through climate change the Earth is experiencing more violent and destructive storms.
Sea Smoke on Gichigami for soprano, bassoon, and piano by Jenni Brandon tells of the Ojibwe people’s legend of the mythical creatures that live below the waters of Lake Superior (Gichigami). Poetry by Anishinaabe author Linda LeGarde Grover.
We Are Joy, a piano concerto with choir and chamber orchestra celebrates that WE are joy, all poems and all songs. Poem by Oliver Mayer. Duration approximately 25 minutes. Great to pair with Beethoven’s Choral Fantasy.
3 PADEREWSKIS: An Opera in One Act
At his grave, we meet three versions of Paderewski (one of them female): Ignacy the virtuoso pianist/composer, Jan the politician/founder of the Polish nation, and Paderewski the éminence grise/Paso Robles winemaker. Coming together and pulling apart, sifting through a lifetime of memories far too large for any one person, they summon the ghost of Antonina, their beloved long-dead first wife. In so doing, they summon the spirit of Poland itself. A compassionate opera about a man who changed the world not only through his music but through pure passion for life, whose memory instructs our own moment of political and moral crisis.