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History
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Commissioned for and first performed by The New York Youth Symphony on 28 April 2002 in Carnegie Hall, New York, New York, Mischa Santora, conductor. Additional performances by the Haddonfield Symphony and the Pacific Symphony.
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Program Note
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The challenge of capturing the visual arts in sound, through its intrinsic colors, rhythms, shapes, textures, internal harmonies, and techniques, has stirred the imaginations of countless composers for numerous centuries. Mussorgsky was inspired by paintings of Viktor Hartmann [Pictures at an Exhibition], Rachmaninov and Reger by Bšcklin [Isle of the Dead], and Debussy by Whistler, Velasquez, Watteau and Botticelli. Beethoven related the key of B minor to the color black. Michael Torke, in his earlier works for orchestra, associated particular colors with specific harmonies and orchestrational textures. The artist Paul Klee felt that his works were infused with the rhythms and counterpoint of musical composition, saying that color could be played like a 'chromatic keyboard'. Dozens of composers have been inspired by Klee's paintings, including myself.
MOSAIC was directly inspired by the mosaic technique of the visual arts. This method of creating images by embedding small bits of colored stone, glass, or tile in mortar has been in existence for thousands of years. Mosaics can found all over the world, from magnificent churches in Europe to the gritty subway system of New York City. In my work, numerous motivic cells and gestures, such as the Moby-esque atmospheric string writing of the opening/closing and the Tchaikovsky-like brass and percussion eruptions of the climax, are inlaid sonically, depicting the mosaic technique. Because these small motives and gestures provide shape and direction to the entire composition, they are similar in purpose and effect to the bits of stone, glass, or tile that combine to create a mosaic.
MOSAIC was premiered by the New York Youth Symphony in Carnegie Hall on 28 April 2002.
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