Elegy
Instrumentation
Duration
Performance Information
Score
Program Notes
This piece was written for the memorial service for my grandmother, Nell Novak, who was a prominent cello teacher, primarily at the Music Institute of Chicago. It was the first piece that professional musicians had ever performed one of my pieces. I was honored to have it premiered by my sister Amy (who at the time was studying violin at the New England Conservatory), Cathy Basrak (principal violist of the Boston Pops and assistant principal violist of the Boston Symphony Orchestra), and Wendy Warner (one of my grandmother’s star pupils, who went on to study with Rostropovich and has had a storied solo and teaching career herself).
This piece was written to express the emotions I felt when I was told that my grandmother was going to die very soon. Thus, it is quite somber. Its harmonic language echoes Bartók and Shostakovich, whom my grandmother was fond of. The piece vacillates between A minor and C minor, finally resolving at the very end into C major.
The piece is structured in three sections. The first section introduces the A-B-A-F♯ motif, which only directly occurs three times in the piece, as well as the A-B♭-A♭-A motif, which permeates the piece. The second and longest section introduces the “mourning” theme in the cello, with the viola playing a soft harmonic. The entire section uses fugal imitation throughout, leading from the initial entrances through a chorale-like section with more consonant harmony, to a tumultuous build-up to a climax where the opening motif is finally repeated again. The third section shows the first hint of sun breaking through the clouds; and at the very end of the piece, the mourning theme reappears, fittingly played by the cello, but transformed into a beautiful apotheosis as the departed soul rises from the earth.