Program Notes by Dr. K. Dawn Grapes
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Program Notes by Dr. K. Dawn Grapes, ©2023
Program Notes by Dr. William E. Runyan
With a “keen ear for musical color and a deft ability to adapt structural elements from popular music into the symphonic idiom” (Houston Chronicle), contemporary composer Michael Abels has gained widespread recognition for his orchestral piece Global Warming. …it has been given nearly 100 performances by orchestras including Chicago, Cleveland, Atlanta, Houston, Baltimore, Louisville, Columbus, Indianapolis, Dallas, Detroit, Nashville, Phoenix, West Virginia, New Mexico, Tucson, Savannah, Dayton, and Toledo as well as the Civic Orchestra of Chicago.
Global Warming is an orchestral work that uses the term to describe the warming of international relations that was happening around the world in 1990. The Berlin Wall had just come down, the Cold War was declared over. “I wanted to write a piece that explored the similarities I heard between music of various cultures,” Abels said. “It begins with a desert scene, a depiction of a futuristic vast desert, with desert locusts buzzing in the background. But soon the piece turns quite uplifting. There are elements of Irish music, African music, Persian rhythms, drones, blended to display their commonalities in a way that is often quite joyous.” But rather than end happily, the piece suddenly returns to its original, stark, desert scene, leaving it to the listener to decide which version of global warming they prefer. At the time of its premiere, the term “global warming” was not the politically charged term it is today. The piece was not written as a political statement, but its political message has inevitably deepened as climate change has evolved from theory into reality.
Michael Abels is best-known for his scores for the Oscar-winning film GET OUT, and for Jordan Peele’s US, for which Abels won the World Soundtrack Award, the Jerry Goldsmith Award, a Critics Choice nomination, an Image Award nomination, and multiple critics’ awards. The hip-hop influenced score for US was short-listed for the Oscar, and was even named “Score of the Decade” by online publication The Wrap.
As a concert composer, Abels has received grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, Meet the Composer, and the Sphinx Organization, among others. His orchestral works have been performed by the Chicago Symphony, the Cleveland Orchestra, the Atlanta Symphony, the Philadelphia Orchestra, and many more. As guest conductor of GET OUT IN CONCERT, Abels has led orchestras such as the National Symphony and the San Francisco Symphony. Several of his orchestral works have been recorded by the Chicago Sinfonietta on the Cedille label, including Delights & Dances and Global Warming. He is co-founder of the Composers Diversity Collective, an advocacy group to increase visibility of composers of color in film, game and streaming media.
Recent projects include the ballet for concert band Falling Sky for Butler University, At War with Ourselves for the Kronos Quartet, and the Hugh Jackman HBO film Bad Education.
Program Notes by Dr. William E. Runyan, ©2023
