Remembering the Sea (Se Souvenant de la Mer, for chorus and orchestra) (2016)
INSTRUMENTATION: 1(pic).1.1(Ebcl).1/1110/timp(perc)/pf/str (min 6.6.4.3.2 players)
DURATION: 18 Minutes
PREMIERE: 9 June 2016; The Knights San Francisco Girls Chorus; New York Philharmonic Biennial; Rose Theatre; New York, NY
Alternate version available for chorus and ensemble.
Composer note:
I’d planned originally to write a work for the SF Girl’s Chorus with a wide range of Sappho translations made through the centuries, but following the Paris and San Bernadino massacres I felt a urgent need to respond through music, so I asked Kai Hoffman-Krull to create a text. Remembering the Sea is in 3 movements — the first a song of memory, the second a kind of Dies Irae and the third a song that asks many questions but finds no answers.
Remembering the Sea (Se Souvenant de la Mer) was generously commissioned by the San Francisco Girls Chorus for this collaboration with the Knights at today’s concert.
— Aaron Jay Kernis
Work themes: Nature