SOLI Chamber Ensemble’s first concert of the 2022-2023 season is Rooted on September 26, exploring works that fuse together nature, arts, and ideas to complement the San Antonio Botanical Garden’s current exhibit, Rooted (large-scale sculpture by Steve Tobin). Works by Angélica Negrón, Andrew Rodriguez, Hee Yun Kim, Kati Agócs, Ludmila Yurina, and Christopher Vu frame the world premiere of I Remember You by emerging African-American composer Benjamin Horne, winner of the inaugural Cross-Country Chamber Consortium award, of which SOLI is a founding member.
SOLI opens the concert with Boston-based composer Christopher Vu‘s reflection on the degree of disorder and randomness in the universe in Holy Mess, written for the ensemble in 2018. Kati Agócs offers a plaintive meditation on hiatus, absence, and longing in Thirst and Quenching, written at the request of noted violinist Jennifer Koh for her “Alone Together” project. Hee Yun Kim weaves the ideas of nature and disruption – pandemic and climate change – together in RIP 2020 for clarinet and soprano; SOLI welcomes soprano Bronwyn White to the stage for this performance.
- Monday, September 26 2022
- 7:00 pm
- San Antonio Botanical Garden
The centerpiece of the concert is the world premiere of I Remember You by emerging African-American composer Benjamin Horne. Inspired by the subject of memory loss particularly as one ages while still trying to maintain their connection with loved ones, the composer traces the emotions of confusion and despair felt in reaching for elusive memories to the moment of recognition and clarity as faces and memories come into focus. The work is a joint commission by the Cross-County Chamber Consortium and will have subsequent performances by other member ensembles this season in Houston, Atlanta, Chicago, and New York.
SOLI continues its support of the people of Ukraine in 2022-2023 with three works by Ukrainian composers programmed throughout the season. The first is Ludmila Yurina’s Irrlicht, which demands a tour de force of extended techniques from the solo cellist. Known for works that include accordions, robotic instruments, toys, and electronics, Puerto Rican-born composer Angélica Negrón’s Columpio features interlocking sections that move from dreamy to eerie to wistful with sounds evocative of nature. The concert closes with Andrew Rodriguez’s Dark Water which explores the magnificence of nature, and the brutality of nature’s intersection with the industrial world.