Berlin Songs No. 3 (Excerpt, Ending) by Jason Thorpe Buchanan - III. A Boat

Berlin Songs - III. A Boat (Excerpt, Ending)

This collaborative project was initiated when composer Jason Thorpe Buchanan, conductor Thomas Heuser, and poet Kate Thorpe first met as Fulbright fellows in Marburg, Germany, August of 2010. The potential subject matter for Kate's soon to be written poetry was discussed at length, exploring themes such as distance, time, memory, culture, and the creative process, as well as the role of art in modern society.

In later correspondence she described her interest in "making connections and erasing distinctions (new growth, life, oddness, distortion, re-seeing of the everyday world)" and "having a central strand that remains constant", for other ideas to "grow or be juxtaposed against.... I think of a spiral often-that you're in roughly the same place but further out/in-also different." In composing these songs, my intention was to retain Kate's idea of a spiral, where one remains at a fixed point spatially and observes their surroundings change, thus shifting perspectives while physically remaining in stasis. This principle is applied harmonically and thematically through polytonality and the superimposition of germinal pitch and rhythmic materials, while simultaneously retaining a strong sense of centricity.

I have found that the opportunity to write these songs has come at a stage in my life where, as an American composer living in Germany, my mind is constantly filled with thoughts, questions, and doubts regarding my own aesthetic values and national identity. How can the familiar and unknown be reconciled-- the comfortable and the unsettling, the romantic and the avant-garde, the old and the new? These are questions that I have asked myself over and over again throughout the process of composing these works. My hope is that these issues are reflected in the musical atmosphere within which these songs exist, alongside the tension, fragmentation, decay, roughness, expression and space alluded to in Kate's poetry.
- Jason Thorpe Buchanan

The original version of this work (for soprano, baritone, flute, oboe/english horn, violin, violoncello, percussion, and piano) was premiered at the Akademie der Künste in Berlin, Germany on March 22, 2011 as part of the Pan-European Fulbright conference by American Fulbright musicians studying in Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Sweden, Hungary, and the Netherlands.

Total duration (3 songs): 18 minutes; Composed December 2010 - February 2011 in Hamburg, Germany
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III. A Boat - text by Katherine Thorpe

A dam is but a boat
to let us in where the water
is clean and calm in the wind.

A shore is but a shore
to land, a sea
a bridge to dam * & art makes holes
to reflect
"the mirror of the soul."
The stones only

stones. To
shore? Who
knows?
(Will we return?)

For more information, please visit http://www.jasonthorpebuchanan.com

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