CFAMC Listening Page #1

First issued November 14, 2004

A monthly musical offering by a composer member of the Christian Fellowship of Art Music Composers.
Both your listening and comments are encouraged.

Donald M. Wilson

Nocturne

Piano solo

Performed by Marilyn Shrude

Program Notes

A clear cut descendant of Chopin’s twenty nocturnes in style as well as form, Nocturne is heard as a five-part rondo with introduction and coda. Compositionally, it is built on a symmetrical 12-tone chord with a four-octave span: C# G# D# E B F# G D A Bb F C. This palindromic structure (palindromic by hexachord as well as overall) is never heard in its entirety but only in segments. For instance, the opening motive E F# B G, E F# B G followed by D over D# uses (respectively) notes 4, 6, 5, 7, 8 and 3 of the original set.

The piece was compiled with the aid of a computer program called Dr. T’s KCS or Keyboard-Controlled Sequencer. With this software, I was able to capture and store each of the thematic and motivic elements in a separate compartment, string these units together in a variety of combinations, screen each sequence individually via MIDI playback into a Kawai K-5 keyboard, and finally choose the most effective sequence for transcription into conventional piano notation.

Beyond all the technical aspects, Nocturne is also a fantasy of intense personal emotions: hope, worry, fear, exaltation. Through the course of the movement these feelings are introduced one by one, explored, rehearsed, analyzed and resolved.

While originally intended to be part of my HEXAGON for piano and computer-generated sounds (1990-92), Nocturne can be presented as a self-contained piece for solo piano. The first of the six movements to be completed, it is the only one to be independent of the computer-generated sounds that are so integral to the other five movements.

Composer's Statement of Faith

Inspiration: what is it? where does it come from?

One idea is that there is a continuous stream of music in the cosmos somewhere, a kind of “continuum” that composers can tap into for all their musical materials free of charge. Charles Ives occasionally referred to the “collective unconscious”—and even John Cage suggested the existence of this celestial river of ideas in his writings and/or lectures.

Another notion is that all music pre-exists: it is up to the composer to discover it and bring it out into the open for others to see (the score) and hear (a performance).

Inspiration: a gift from God?

Just a month after my thirteenth birthday, I came to know the Lord as my personal savior in August 1950. Almost ten years later, in March of 1960, I wrote my first composition of any substance: DEDICATION for String Orchestra. It has always been my conviction that this piece was divinely inspired from beginning to end. I have always believed that I was the conduit through which the music passed from the Creator into the physical world to be performed, recorded, heard by many and yes even published.

Inspiration: listening to the world?

In some of the music that I wrote in the 1960s, I consciously focused on the age-old conflict of Good versus Evil: in the first movement of my Quintet for Clarinet & String Quartet; in the first movement of my Concerto for Piano and Wind Orchestra; etc. What I have always considered to be the source for this compositional approach was the music of Carl Nielsen, specifically his Fourth and Fifth Symphonies. But subconsciously I may have also been serving the Lord by writing what He wanted me to write.

Inspiration: listening to the Lord?

Sometime during the 1990s I came to believe that God is the source of my inspiration, that in fact God is the Continuum of all musical materials (and all artistic materials, too, for that matter)—not only for me but for anyone who wants to seek it out and ask for it.

Perhaps He even tells us this, through the pen of the Apostle Paul— “And God is able to make all grace abound toward you; that ye, always having all sufficiency in all things, may abound to every good work.” (II Corinthians 9:8)

Whether this continuum of creativity is available to anyone at all or just to born-again Christians, I have no idea. That is another matter for another time.

Composer Biography

A native of Chicago, Donald M. Wilson studied composition with Karel Husa and Robert Palmer at Cornell University and with Gunther Schuller at the Berkshire Music Center (Tanglewood). In 1965 Wilson became the first music director of the educational FM station in Philadelphia now known as WHYY-FM. Now a professor emeritus at Bowling Green State University, Wilson joined the BGSU music faculty in 1967, taught music theory, analysis and composition for 31 years and chaired the Music Composition/ History Department for two four-year terms (1973-77; 1994-98). From 1983 to 1995 Wilson produced over 80 one-hour programs in the annual “New Music Festival” radio series for national distribution. A member of the American Music Center since 1964 and a member of the American Composers Alliance since 1967, Wilson became a founding member of the Christian Fellowship of Art Music Composers in 1995. Three years later he was elected to the latter organization’s Board of Directors. In addition, he serves the Fellowship as the Coordinator of Regional Activities.

- - -  SOLI DEO GLORIA!  - - -

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