Robert Carl
Encyclopedia
Composer
A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...
who currently resides in Hartford, Connecticut
Hartford, Connecticut
Hartford is the capital of the U.S. state of Connecticut. The seat of Hartford County until Connecticut disbanded county government in 1960, it is the second most populous city on New England's largest river, the Connecticut River. As of the 2010 Census, Hartford's population was 124,775, making...
, where he is chair of the composition department at the Hartt School of Music, University of Hartford
University of Hartford
The University of Hartford is a private, independent, nonsectarian, coeducational university located in West Hartford, Connecticut. The degree programs at the University of Hartford hold the highest levels of accreditation available in the US, including the Engineering Accreditation Commission of...
.
Music
Carl studied with Jonathan KramerJonathan Kramer
Jonathan Donald Kramer , was a U.S. composer and music theorist.- Biography :...
, George Rochberg
George Rochberg
George Rochberg was an American composer of contemporary classical music.-Life:Rochberg was born in Paterson, New Jersey. He attended the Mannes College of Music, where his teachers included George Szell and Hans Weisse, and the Curtis Institute of Music, where he studied with Rosario Scalero and...
, Ralph Shapey
Ralph Shapey
Ralph Shapey was an American composer and conductor. He is well-known for his work as a composition professor at the University of Chicago, where he founded and directed the Contemporary Chamber Players...
, and Iannis Xenakis
Iannis Xenakis
Iannis Xenakis was a Romanian-born Greek ethnic, naturalized French composer, music theorist, and architect-engineer. He is commonly recognized as one of the most important post-war avant-garde composers...
. From each respectively, the composer has commented that he feels he learned about time, history, counterpoint
Counterpoint
In music, counterpoint is the relationship between two or more voices that are independent in contour and rhythm and are harmonically interdependent . It has been most commonly identified in classical music, developing strongly during the Renaissance and in much of the common practice period,...
/phrasing, and form. His music finds its roots in the spirit of eclectic juxtapositions, transcendentalism
Transcendentalism
Transcendentalism is a philosophical movement that developed in the 1830s and 1840s in the New England region of the United States as a protest against the general state of culture and society, and in particular, the state of intellectualism at Harvard University and the doctrine of the Unitarian...
, and experiment embodied in the output of Charles Ives
Charles Ives
Charles Edward Ives was an American modernist composer. He is one of the first American composers of international renown, though Ives' music was largely ignored during his life, and many of his works went unperformed for many years. Over time, Ives came to be regarded as an "American Original"...
and other American "ultramodernists", including Carl Ruggles
Carl Ruggles
Charles "Carl" Sprague Ruggles was an American composer of the American Five group. He wrote finely crafted pieces using "dissonant counterpoint", a term coined by Charles Seeger to describe Ruggles' music...
.
Carl’s music until 1997 tends to explore different styles, and to create unusual syntheses thereof. A history
History
History is the discovery, collection, organization, and presentation of information about past events. History can also mean the period of time after writing was invented. Scholars who write about history are called historians...
major as an undergraduate at Yale University
Yale University
Yale University is a private, Ivy League university located in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States...
, he has felt that the musical past is a fertile source to be manipulated for new expressive purposes. Duke Meets Mort (1992) is a saxophone quartet that interprets the harmonic changes of Duke Ellington
Duke Ellington
Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington was an American composer, pianist, and big band leader. Ellington wrote over 1,000 compositions...
’s Mood Indigo
Mood Indigo
"Mood Indigo" is a jazz composition and song, with music by Duke Ellington and Barney Bigard with lyrics by Irving Mills.-Disputed authorship:In a 1987 interview, Mitchell Parish claimed to have written the lyrics:...
in the voice of Morton Feldman
Morton Feldman
Morton Feldman was an American composer, born in New York City.A major figure in 20th century music, Feldman was a pioneer of indeterminate music, a development associated with the experimental New York School of composers also including John Cage, Christian Wolff, and Earle Brown...
. Time/Memory/Shadow (1988) is a double trio (piano quintet and harp) based on a march written in the composer’s adolescence, which is slowly “excavated” in the course of the piece, and only revealed at the end.
From 1998 on, starting with Open for string trio, Carl’s music has become less referential. Since 2001 he has developed a technique of basing his harmonies on the overtone series, with common partials above different fundamentals serving as pivots for progressions and modulations. In American Music in the Twentieth Century, critic Kyle Gann
Kyle Gann
Kyle Eugene Gann is an American professor of music, critic and composer born in Dallas, Texas. As a critic for The Village Voice and other publications he has been a supporter of progressive music including such Downtown movements as postminimalism and totalism.- As composer :As a composer his...
described Carl's more recent style: "(he) has settled into a more serene, meditative idiom, but still with a dissonant edge." More recent works that represent this approach include The Wind’s Trace Rests on Leaves and Waves (2005) for string quintet (premiered by the Miami String Quartet
Miami String Quartet
The Miami String Quartet is an American string quartet. The group was founded in 1988 at The New World School of the Arts by John de Lancie in Miami, Florida, and is now Quartet in Residence at Kent State University in Kent, Ohio, where all four members serve as faculty members in the School of...
and Robert Black
Robert Black
Robert Black may refer to:* Robert Black , former head coach for the Sewanee college football team* Robert Black , British author of fiction and nonfiction...
), Marfa
Marfa
Marfa may refer to:People* Marfa Boretskaya* Marfa Sobakina* Marfa Samuilovna Skavronskaya Places* Marfa, TexasMeteorology* Marfa frontMusic* Marfa Music* Marfa...
ntasie (2004) for electric guitar and large ensemble, Shake the Tree for piano four-hands (2005), A Musical Enquiry Into the Sublime and Beautiful (2006–07) for chamber orchestra, and Fourth Symphony (2008). Carl also frequently collaborates with sculptor Karen McCoy, creating sound components of installation art
Installation art
Installation art describes an artistic genre of three-dimensional works that are often site-specific and designed to transform the perception of a space. Generally, the term is applied to interior spaces, whereas exterior interventions are often called Land art; however, the boundaries between...
works, including pieces for the Sculpture Key Festivals of 2009 and 2010.
Writings
Since 1994, Carl has been a critic for Fanfare magazineFanfare Magazine
Fanfare is a magazine devoted to reviewing classical music performance and recordings.Fanfare's contributors have a range of expertise from the medieval to contemporary work...
, where he writes extensively on new music recordings. In addition, he has completed a book on Terry Riley
Terry Riley
Terrence Mitchell Riley, is an American composer intrinsically associated with the minimalist school of Western classical music and was a pioneer of the movement...
’s In C
In C
In C is a semi-aleatoric musical piece composed by Terry Riley in 1964 for any number of people, although he suggests "a group of about 35 is desired if possible but smaller or larger groups will work"...
, published in 2009 by Oxford University Press
Oxford University Press
Oxford University Press is the largest university press in the world. It is a department of the University of Oxford and is governed by a group of 15 academics appointed by the Vice-Chancellor known as the Delegates of the Press. They are headed by the Secretary to the Delegates, who serves as...
. His interest in Japanese music (Carl often performs his own music on the shakuhachi
Shakuhachi
The is a Japanese end-blown flute. It is traditionally made of bamboo, but versions now exist in ABS and hardwoods. It was used by the monks of the Fuke school of Zen Buddhism in the practice of...
) led to a residency in Tokyo
Tokyo
, ; officially , is one of the 47 prefectures of Japan. Tokyo is the capital of Japan, the center of the Greater Tokyo Area, and the largest metropolitan area of Japan. It is the seat of the Japanese government and the Imperial Palace, and the home of the Japanese Imperial Family...
in spring 2007, which resulted in interviews with 25 contemporary Japanese composers.
Selected works
Orchestral and ensemble- Symphony No. 2 "Liberty and/or Death" (1989–1992)
- Marfantasie for electric guitar and large ensemble (2004)
- A Musical Enquiry Into the Sublime and Beautiful for chamber orchestra (2006–2007)
- La Ville Engloutie for wind ensemble (2007)
- Symphony No. 4 "The Ladder" (2008)
Chamber music
- String Quartet No. 1 "A Path between Cloud and Light" (1985)
- Roundabout for contrabass and fixed electronic part (1988)
- Time/Memory/Shadow for double trio (piano, 2 violins, viola, cello, harp or synthesizer/sampler) (1988)
- Duke Meets Mort for saxophone quartet (1992)
- A Sampler of the Senses for viola, cello and piano (1994)
- Open for string trio (1998)
- Violin Sonata No. 2 "Angel Skating" (1999)
- String Quartet No. 2 "Fear of Death/Love of Life" (2001)
- Piano Trio No. 2 "The Blossom" (2002)
- Excavating the Perfect Farewell for viola and piano (2003)
- The Wind's Trace Rests on Leaves and Waves for string quintet (2005)
- A Clean Sweep for shakuhachiShakuhachiThe is a Japanese end-blown flute. It is traditionally made of bamboo, but versions now exist in ABS and hardwoods. It was used by the monks of the Fuke school of Zen Buddhism in the practice of...
and Max/MSP (2005)
Piano
- Piano Sonata No.1 "Spiral Dances" (1984)
- Braided Bagatelles for solo piano (2001)
- Shake the Tree for piano four-hands (2005)
Vocal
- Our Heart and Home Is with Infinitude for soprano and piano (1998)
- Simic Songs, 15 Madrigals for 4 voices on poems of Charles SimicCharles SimicDušan "Charles" Simić is a Serbian-American poet, and was co-Poetry Editor of the Paris Review. He was appointed the fifteenth Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress in 2007.-Early years:...
(2004)