A new theme and variations for saxophones
Every composer writes for orchestra or large ensemble—at first, usually long before they should, before they have the technical skills to do so or the trust of a conductor or ensemble to perform their music.
I was not immune to this allure. My effort was a 10-minute tone poem titled “…a slightly greener thing…”, the title borrowed from a passage early in American author Richard Powers’ book “The Overstory”:
“A chorus of living wood sings to the woman: If your mind were only a slightly greener thing, we would drown you in meaning.
The pine she leans against says: Listen. There’s something you need to hear.”
At the center of the orchestral piece is a gentle, quietly joyful tune that evokes the elemental care and tenderness the world has for its living things—a world not indifferent to life but supremely hospitable to it, actively bringing about its existence and fostering its evolution and flourishing across four billion years.
Though the original piece didn’t gain a champion to perform it, there was much in it I was proud of and thought should live beyond this first fruitless foray into orchestral writing.
The idea to write a set of variations for a smaller ensemble based on this tune came a few years later. It is likewise inspired by the borrowed-from passage from Powers—the variations akin to all the different ways the world “sings” to us, showing its care for us through gifts of food, water, shelter, medicine, weather—giving of its very body for us to live. I thought perhaps meditating on the idea—that this earth is not indifferent to us, but loves us, wants us to be and do well—and expressing that across two-dozen variations might help that message sink in, inviting reflection on how we can show our appreciation in return.
Last month, the Portland Saxophone Ensemble brought this set of variations to vivid life at Chamber Music Northwest’s Summer Festival in a performance warm, effervescent, patient, and finally impassioned.
This music travels from a sweet and simple rendering of the original tune to a rocking choral-like finale via many shades of joy, contemplation, gratefulness, challenge, loss, refinding a way forward, and, if such a thing is possible, some kind of humbled glory. Along the way, I ask the ensemble to evoke the wind, a mountain-distant hunting party, an organ, two kinds of church services, stargazing, the experience of eating too-hot pizza, and a horseback dash homeward.
While writing the variations, I learned of several pregnancies among my family and friends. Some of the variations are dedicated to and named for the then-pending child/children, with variations assigned according to which one I was writing when I got the news. Other variations are named for and evocative of places in my pacific northwest home.
