Musik Fabrik welcomes composer Gloria Coates

The newest addition to Musik Fabrik's roster is the American composer Gloria Coates, the woman composer who has written more symphonies than any other woman in history. Ms. Coates' First Symphony "Music for Open Strings" is considered one of the most important works in microtonal music and has written fifteen other symphonies, many of which have been recorded by major orchestras. She has also written nine string quartets, a great deal of chamber music, vocal music and for the theatre.

Her first work published by Musik Fabrik is her Elegy for flute and piano, and was part of our collective homage to Claude Lévi-Strauss on his 100th birthday. The composer gave the following program note for this work :

Elegy was written as a commission in 2002 in the wake of the tragedy of September 11th. Because the emotions were too close to me, I didn't feel like having this work performed. Thus I wrote a different piece for that commission and put Elegy away on a shelf.
It was forgotten completely until this fall when Elizabeth Weinzierl, the German flutist, who had originally commissioned the piece, asked to perform it with the pianist Eva Schieferstein in a concert in Munich's Performing Center Gasteig. Thus, the premier took place October 12, 2008.
A few days later, Paul Wehage asked for a composition in celebration of Claude Levi-Strauss' 100th. birthday. One remembers his great writing Tristes Tropiques which is a romantic elegy on the Amazon.
My own Elegy not only expressed my feelings about the injustice and destructive impulses in the 2001 terrorist attack, but could also include other negative forces in our civilization today such as the destruction of the Amazon. Thus, I have dedicated this work to the 100th. birthday of Claude Levi-Strauss and his untiring energy to elevate the spiritual and ecological thinking and actions in our threatened world.

Elegy for Flute and Piano is available on our Flute music catalog.

Musik Fabrik's project in honor of Claude Lévi-Strauss' 100th birthday

Today is Claude Lévi-Strauss' 100th birthday. Seven Musik Fabrik composers have each written a short piece in honor of the great French Anthropologist which will be published together in the same album. The seven pieces are :

Thérèse Brenet: Dans l'or vibrant du désert... for violin and piano

Gloria Coates: Elegy for flute and piano

Jean-Thierry Boisseau: Sur le bord du fleuve assoupi for flute and marimba

Gian Paolo Chiti: Nocturnal for piano, left hand

Carson Cooman: Un Regard Eloigné for Flugelhorn and Violoncello

Jean-Yves Malmasson: Points de Suspension for Clarinet and Violoncello

Paul Wehage: Savage Thoughts for Tenor Saxophone and Harp

Jean-Thierry Boisseau, who was behind the organization of this project, describes it as follows :

During my participation in the Cahier de L’Herne dedicated to the work of Claude Lévi-Strauss (on the request of Michel Izard), I had the chance to explore the work of this great thinker. He honored me greatly by thanking me for my article which corrected some misunderstandings concerning his ideas about music and also for exposing the poetic qualities of his work...It seemed clear to me that, not being a poet, I should use musical means to honor this great man who could easily have been a musician himself.

Claude Lévi-Strauss is celebrating his 100th birthday. I asked several of my friends who are also composers to mark this occasion by writing a short piece. Since Lévi-Strauss is one of the most open spirits which I have been privileged to consider, it was understood that these pieces would also be completely free in both instrumentation and form. Six different composers of different ages and nationalities agreed to write works.

Thérèse Brenet; First Grand Prix de Rome; Gloria Coates; the noted American doyen of German composers; Gian Paolo Chiti, ancien vice-directeur of the Academia Santa Cecilia de Rome and pianist; Carson P. Cooman; organist and graduate of Harvard University; Jean-Yves Malmasson; First prize of the CNSM de Paris, pianist, ondist and conductor; Paul Wehage; First prize of the CNSM de Paris, saxophonist and conductor: these six musicians are, in addition to their many musical talents, first-rate composers. I wrote the seventh work myself.

This is a celebration of Lévi-Strauss outside of all official commemorations and with no preoccupations towards the media. Rather, this is an imitate way of thanking an important thinker who has given us new ideas, stimulated our own reflection and has given us much pleasure.

Jean-Thierry BOISSEAU.