Program for February 22, 2026. Two Harps & Friends
Quatre Preludes, Opus 16 Marcel Tournier (1879–1951)
I. Tranquillo
II. Pas trop vite
III. Lent
IV. Allegretto
Paris 1967 Stella Sung (b. 1959)
I. Moderato
II. Andante
III. Allegro con spirito
Nuit d’etoiles Claude Debussy (1862–1918)
Siete canciones populares españolas Manuel de Falla
I. El paño moruno (1876–1946)
II. Seguidilla murciana
III. Asturiana
IV. Jota V. Nana
VI. Canción
VII. Polo
Intermission
Quartet for flute, clarinet, bassoon, and harp Lior Navok (b. 1971)
Program Notes
Quatre Préludes, Opus 16 Marcel Tournier Marcel Tournier (1879–1951) was a French harpist, composer, and music educator whose compositions expanded the harp repertoire and stretched the technical capabilities of performers at the instrument. Marcel entered the Paris Conservatory as a harp student at age 16, and later succeeded his teacher at the conservatory to become professor of harp from 1912–1948. Tournier’s compositional output is small and largely focused on harp music, among which his Quatre Préludes Op. 16 is an early work. Composed in 1903, the piece comprises a set of four short preludes and has since entered the harp standard repertoire. The first prelude, Tranquille, presents a pleasant, flowing melody which is occasionally interrupted by passages of rolled harmonies. Pas trop vite (not too fast) is in a heavily ornamented dance style in triple meter. Prelude three is a lyrical slow movement marked Lent while the fourth prelude, Allegretto, features a dotted-rhythm that ties together various melodic and chordal sections which progress through a wide range of harmonies.
Paris 1987 Stella SungStella Sung (b. 1959) is an international award-winning composer whose music has been performed throughout the United States and abroad. She has been Composer-in-Residence for the Orlando Philharmonic Orchestra and Dayton Performing Arts Alliance, and is currently in residency with Dance Alive National Ballet in Gainesville, FL. In addition to premieres and commissions of her music by Yo-Yo Ma, the German Ministry of Culture, and the Hong Kong Philharmonic (among many others), several documentary films have been made about Sung’s work. Dr. Sung is a graduate of the Universities of Michigan (Ann Arbor), Florida, and Texas at Austin, and currently holds a “Pegasus” distinguished professorship at the University of Central Florida. Among Sung’s compositional output are opera and ballet, large ensemble works for choir, orchestra and voice, and chamber and solo works for an assortment of instruments. Paris 1987 is set in three movements: Moderato, Andante, and Allegro con spirito. About her piece, Stella Sung writes “Paris 1987, for flute, clarinet, and bassoon, was written in July 1987 upon my return from a trip to Europe. Written as a “divertissement,” the work is light-hearted in character and spirit, and is intentionally reflective of earlier styles of French music found at the beginning of the twentieth century. I like to think of this work as a kind of ‘musical postcard’.”
Nuit d’etoiles Claude DebussyClaude Debussy (1862–1918) is one of the most innovative and original composers in music history. A talented child, Debussy was admitted to the Paris Conservatory at the age of ten. However, Debussy ultimately found inspiration from outside of the academy (especially Franz Liszt and Richard Wagner) as his conservative teachers disapproved of the unorthodox harmonic and stylistic choices in his music. Claude Debussy wrote Nuit d’etoiles (Starry Night) in Paris in 1880, which sets a poem by French poet Théodore de Banville in the soprano part alongside harp accompaniment.
Siete canciones populares españolas Manuel de FallaSpanish composer and pianist Manuel de Falla (1876–1946) was one of Spain’s most renowned musicians of the early 20th century. Manuel de Falla’s formal music studies were at the Real Conservatorio de Música y Declamación in Madrid, after which he lived in Paris from 1907–1914. While there de Falla met a diverse group of artists who had a significant influence on his compositional style, including Maurice Ravel, Claude Debussy, Paul Dukas, Igor Stravinsky, Isaac Albéniz and the ballet impresario Sergei Diaghilev. Following his time in Madrid and Paris, de Falla spent two decades in Granada, where he composed, collaborated with regional bands and orchestras, and organized a flamenco dance and music festival. Following the Spanish Civil War Manuel de Falla fled to Argentina, where he continued to compose and teach until his death. Among de Falla’s compositional output are a few orchestral and choral works, a handful of chamber works, and a sizable selection of piano pieces, vocal works, and arrangements of other composers’ music. Siete canciones populares españolas (Seven Spanish Folk Songs) is a set of traditional Spanish songs arranged for soprano and piano by Manuel de Falla in 1914 in Paris, just before the outbreak of World War I forced his return to Spain. The first movement, El paño moruno (The Moorish Cloth) is a folk song from the Spanish province of Murcia which combines a flamenco dance at the piano with a striking melody in the soprano part. The flamenco style consists of a quick dance with three beats per measure and is characterized by a fast, often triplet rhythm on beat two. The second movement is a folk dance from the same province, Murcia, and features a blazing fast piano part punctuated with short, melodic bursts from the soprano. Marked Andante tranquillo, the third movement is a slow and haunting lyrical song from the northwest province of Asturias. Jota is a traditional genre of folk songs and courtship dances from northern Spain. The popular dance features a couple holding their arms high and clicking castanets as they execute lively, bouncing steps. In de Falla’s setting the piano fills in for the traditional guitar and provides active rhythmic backdrop to the soprano’s love song. The fifth movement, Nana, is a lullaby to a child which sets a slowly rolling piano part underneath a bel canto melody (an operatic style of lyricism which translates to “beautiful singing”) ornamented in the Spanish style. Canción, the sixth movement, is a song lamenting a lost love to one’s mother set over an anxious piano part. The dramatic final movement, Polo, is a song despairing love from the Andalusian region which bemoans “wretched love” and “he who gave me to understand it!” Today, we will hear de Falla’s piano parts played by two harps as arranged in 1932 by French harpist Charles Salzedo (1885–1961).
Quartet for flute, clarinet, bassoon, and harp Lior NavokLior Navok (b. 1971) is an Israeli classical composer, conductor, and pianist. He was born in Tel Aviv and studied composition with Israeli composer Moshe Zorman. He completed a bachelor’s degree at the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance, where he studied composition with Yinam Leef. He later completed a Masters and Doctorate at the new England Conservatory where he studied with John Harbison. Internationally acclaimed, his works have been performed at Carnegie Hall, Berlin Philharmonie, Sydney Opera House, and Deutsche Opera Berlin. Described by the Boston Globe as “colorful, haunting, accomplished, and exciting,” his music has been championed by leading orchestras and ensembles including the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, Opera Frankfurt, Konzerthausorchester Berlin, and the Christchurch Symphony Orchestra. Navok’s catalogue spans more than 90 works, ranging from opera and oratorio to chamber, solo, and stage works for young audiences. Navok’s music appears on Naxos, Centaur, and other labels, and he is the recipient of numerous awards, including the Israel Prime Minister award in 2002 and 2010 and commissions from the Koussevitzky and Fromm Music Foundations. Lior Navok’s Quartet for flute, clarinet, bassoon, and harp was written in 1994 and is influenced by impressionistic French music and jazz. The first movement begins with a simple, pastoral character, growing in complexity as it builds towards a dark conclusion. The second movement is a light, flowing piece built around a pentatonic scale theme. A bassoon cadenza serves as a bridge between the second and third movements, the latter being a long Passacaglia (a type of piece organized around a repeating bass line) with a lamenting character. The piccolo replaces the flute as the fourth movement opens with a fugue involving all four instruments, leading into a lyrical second theme followed by a harp solo and a concluding grand finale.
— Paul Zeller
