This past month, I was thankful to have a residency in Hong Kong with The Upstrike:Project, culminating in a Portrait Concert. Working with them on the new work Yet in my sad heart was a highlight. Here’s some photos and videos from their rehearsals!
The work is now available here: https://www.roberthonstein.com/yet-in-my-sad-heart
Program Notes
Yet in my sad heart for percussion quartet and track draws inspiration from the opening of Chopin’s Prelude No. 8 in F sharp Minor. The title comes from pianist Alfred Cortot’s vivid description of the prelude: “The snow falls, the wind screams, and the storm rages; yet in my sad heart,the tempest is the worst to behold.”
Chopin’s Prelude, marked Molto agitato, is a powerful and technically demanding work. It features a continuous flow of thirty-second notes in the right hand against triplet sixteenths in the left, creating a tempestuous, virtuosic soundscape. Within this intricate polyrhythm, a melancholic melody emerges, giving voice to the “sad heart” described by Cortot.
My piece, Yet in my sad heart, offers a hazy, dream-like reinterpretation of the Chopin. Fragments of the Prelude arise from the keyboard percussion instruments, slowed down and stretched out against long, sustained synth tones. Meanwhile, as the music shifts into different key areas, the same four chords that began the Chopin, slowly cycle in the background. We stay in this space, a web of percussion, long synth chords and pulsating rhythms, until eventually a delicate cloud of piano arpeggiations in the track take over, slowly enveloping the live musicians. Finally, the piece culminates in a stream-of-consciousness soundscape of swirling, ghostly tones mixed with real world audio samples, eerily concluding this strange, Chopin-inspired fever dream.
AUDIO RECORDING NOW AVAILABLE ON ORIGIN RECORDS:
Hi friends,
Hope you all have been able to stay cool for this scorcher of a summer! I was lucky enough to make a quick trip to Finland for a performance of my new Endless Landscape at Avanti's Summer Sounds festival, followed by a short visit to MASS MoCA for a stellar performance of An Economy of Means by Doug Perkins at the Bang on a Can Loud weekend, and finally an amazing week in Del Mar, California, teaching at the Del Mar International Composers Symposium. As we head into the fall, I'm excited to give you a season preview and share some new music, upcoming performances and albums in the works.
If you've been following my Facebook Page or Twitter, you'll know that my score for The Real Charlie Chaplin was honored with a News & Documentary Emmy Nomination for Outstanding Music Composition! It continues to be a fun adventure and hope to be able to share more news about the soundtrack soon.
No Exit New Music will premiere a new work of mine for soprano and chamber ensemble in April, and you can check out the ever-expanding season calendar here.
For all the saxophonists and sax/perc. duos out there, Echolocate for alto/soprano sax and marimba is now available for purchase. More info here.
Lastly, an album featuring my An Index of Possibility, Down Down Baby, and Lost and Found, will be released in the spring, with superb performances by TIGUE, New Morse Code, and Michael Compitello. More info coming soon.
Other News
Check out new score follow videos of Olmsted and Arctic, and subscribe to my YouTube channel for new releases.
Other Sheet Music Releases: Evergreen for two percussionists and Endless Landscape for eleven instruments are both now available in PDF and Print Formats.
Alysa Pires's choreography to Conduit: II. Pulse will be programmed by the Alberta Ballet in the Fall. Tickets here.
thanks for tuning in,
Robert
I'm ecstatic and honored to share Mivos Quartet performing "Midnight Sun" from Arctic on Tiny Desk Concert @ NPR Music !!
For purchase information, visit here: Arctic (2013)
In the first of a series of score follower videos, I am releasing Olmsted in honor of Frederick Law Olmsted’s 200th birthday this year, performed by the wonderful Nicholas DiEugenio & Mimi Solomon on their album Unraveling Beethoven.
Work info: Olmsted (2017) for violin and piano
Check out Zoom interview with WGTE’s Brad Cresswell about Middle Ground!
Originally posted here: https://www.wgte.org/radio/podcasts/classical-conversations/robert-honstein-middle-ground
Hub New Music and Robert Honstein: Soul House
Album out TODAY on New Amsterdam Records.
I'm incredibly excited to announce the release of Soul House, recorded by the wonderful Hub New Music. Out yesterday through New Amsterdam Records’ Windmill Series, this album features all nine movements of Soul House, with liner notes by Steve Smith.
This piece is near and dear to me and I couldn't have more fearlessly committed interpreters than Hub. I hope you will give it a listen!
More info on the release: https://www.newamrecords.com/albums/soul-house
Click on the image to Order
New Music Video of the movement “Backyard”!
the arts fuse review of the album
Honstein’s score, which was commissioned by HNM, features a mix of graceful, idiomatic, and virtuosic writing for the ensemble, which plays it here with tremendous control.
- Jonathan Blumhofer, artsfuse