NIGHT TIME
"Say it plainly -- Sebastian Currier's "Night Time" for violin and harp ……is one of the best pieces of contemporary classical music to be played in Washington in a long time. Lyrical, colorful, firmly rooted in tradition and yet absolutely new, "Night Time" is set in five short movements, titled "Dusk," "Sleepless," "Vespers," "Nightwind" and "Starlight." It is written so carefully and specifically for the two instruments that one cannot imagine it any other way….. Currier doesn't waste a note in this set of modern nocturnes, and the performance, by violinist Elisabeth Adkins and harpist Susan Robinson, left nothing to be desired in its evocations of rest and restlessness, quietude and mystery." -Washington Post |
Program Note
The five short movements of Night Time - Dusk, Sleepless, Vespers, Nightwind, and Starlight - share a sense of quietude, introversion, intimacy, and subdued restlessness. The instrumental ensemble itself, violin and harp, suggested to me right from the start a series of nocturnal moments, where a sense of isolation, distance and quiet thoughtfulness would prevail throughout otherwise thematically contrasting movements. From the distant murmuring sounds in Dusk to the disquiet of the pizzicato ostinato and muted chords in Sleepless, from the contemplative lyricism of Vespers to the rushing passage work in Nightwind, and in the hypnotic figurations of Starlight there is an affinity with a phrase of a Wallace Stevens poem, that I set in another work, Vocalissimus: "in the distances of sleep." The piece was written for Marie-Pierre Langlamet, harpist of the Berlin Philharmonic, and violinist Jean-Claude Velin. It was premiered at the Philharmonie in Berlin in 2000. |
Scoring
Violin and Harp
Published by Carl Fischer
Violin and Harp
Published by Carl Fischer