GIRANDO, DANZANDO [1996, REV. 2016]

[Symphony Orchestra (3 {1/picc, 3/alto} 2 3 {2,3/bass cl} 3; 4 2 3 1; 3 perc; hp; pf; strgs)]

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Paul Jacobs Memorial Commission

Premiered at Ozawa Concert Hall, Tanglewood Music Festival, August 13, 1996.

Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra, Stefan Asbury, cond.

DURATION: 11'

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Program note:

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Girando Danzando Girando, Danzando (“Spinning, Dancing”) was commissioned by the Tanglewood Music Center through the Paul Jacobs Memorial Fund. Much of the source material for each of its larger sections derives from two earlier works, “Girándula” and “Fandango y Cuna”. Throughout the piece, treatment emphasizes various motivic, harmonic, instrumental and formal dichotomies. The first half–as if slowly emerging out of those spinning wheels sometimes used in fireworks–gradually dilates until it is thrown amidst a serpentine beam of fire that ultimately dissolves back into nothingness. The boisterous second half is as much a dance as it is a dawdling ritual where materials are introduced and elaborated through the use of juxtaposition and sharp contrasts. The above compositional plan seems to be finding its way with greater frequency into many of my works, perhaps reflecting my own experience as a Mexican artist living and working in the United States.

© 1995, Carlos Sanchez-Gutierrez

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The orchestral commission offered to a former fellow of the TMC went to Carlos Sanchez-Gutierrez (San Francisco) whose Girando, Danzando shows a great awareness of instrumental sound meshed with a perfect ideal of the use of the orchestra.

Paris Transatlantic

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"Every year Tanglewood commissions one of the composing fellows to write an orchestral work for the next summer[...]Last year the award went to Carlos Sanchez-Gutierrez, a 32-year old composer from Mexico who now teaches at San Francisco State University. Having to appear in the context of major works by the great masters of contemporary music has not always been helpful to the The Tanglewood composers, but Sanchez-Gutierrez's 'Girando, Danzando' ('Turning, Dancing') made an effective opening for the concert. The music is vigorous in rhythm and gesture and colorfully orchestrated; there are things about it that suggest a latinate 'La Valse.' The two parts of the piece work differently—the first is developmental, the second juxtapositional, and the composer makes the interesting remark that this reflects his experience as a Mexican artist living and working in America."

Richard Dyer, The Boston Globe