…of Wisdom and Grief is a vocal
poem for soprano and symphony orchestra. The words of the work are the opening
verses of the biblical book of Ecclesiastes
followed by several lines taken from the Psalms.
The surprising thing about these texts is that, despite his despair, the
narrator has the strength to seek for hope. Towards the end of the piece, the
wind instruments enter with a short citation from Palestrina’s Missa Papae Marcello as a musical symbol
of the light and reconciliation.
Written largely in polyphonic texture, the work reveals itself as a combination of atonality and chromatic modality with an expanded role for melodic elements and a modern cantilena. Some quasi-tonal structures are incorporated into a largely non-tonal environment. As in other of my compositions, I tried to avoid violence to the sound material and to create an impression of self-development of musical ideas.
Oleksandr Shchetynsky
© 2024 by Oleksandr Shchetynsky