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Senior (2008)
ensemble solo string quartet and orchestra (1=picc.2.2.2.2-2.1-perc(2)-str.)
commissioned by New York Youth Symphony
premièred March 22, 2009, Carnegie Hall, New York, NY
A solo string quartet is the protagonist in this chamber-like music.
I’ve been thinking about the particular state of mind of a senior, that peculiar combination of expectancy, finality, boredom, and bewilderment that comes at the end of an important but mixed experience.
Senior is a bit sad, but not sentimental— or rather, whenever the music seems about to lapse into premature nostalgia, some new bauble comes along to distract it.
“This pensive and restless music does seem to touch on the conflicting emotions that Mr. Andres identifies with senior slump: expectancy and finality, bewilderment and boredom.
But the piece was fascinating on musical terms alone. As it opens, strings and winds play quietly gurgling figures and oscillating riffs over an ominous pedal tone and sustained chromatic harmonies. The quartet breaks in, giving a poke to the musical ruminations with some jabbing chords.
As the back and forth continues, the opposing materials mix it up, with the nudging quartet becoming more searching, and the ruminative orchestra seizing on the restless bits and running with them. The acuteness of Mr. Andres’s ear lends intricacy to the layered lines and pungency to the piercing harmonies.” -Anthony Tommasini, The New York Times
Listen (excerpt)
ACME String Quartet; Ryan McAdams, conductor; New York Youth Symphony