Black Bridge
Lynn Job
About this work: Publisher -- Buckthorn Music Press (BMP-89) 2007
Style -- 19th C. Gothic Romantic, dark, tragic, tonal/chromatic
Text -- Original story and text (fictional) by Job
http://www.buckthornstudios.com/Bridge_text.pdf
Level -- Difficult - college/professional
Arrangements -- Future adaptations planned. Check with BMP.
NOTES to Reprint:
The Black Bridge story is fictional. The text is original (Song of Solomon 8:7 makes a perfect epilogue). The structure and style evokes perhaps an 18th/19th century European Gothic treatment of this tragic winter tale - youths lost by night from a frozen remote bridge, perhaps in a wood. One could easily imagine Franz Schubert or Robert Schumann would have chosen such a text. Job’s music paints this story with neo-romantic 4-part settings contrasting thinner chromatic moments in counterpoint to the romantic and bold solo cello line “singing” its own parallel narration of the tale. The sparse, soloistic nuances, the chromaticisms and timbral shadings, and the balance and blend between the chorus and solo cello make this a challenging work—the results are a compelling and dramatic entertainment spiced with the ghostly leitmotif. The abrupt ending leaves a chill in the air with an eerie, heart wrenching echo.
Version: SATB with violoncello
Year composed: 2007
Duration: 00:05:15
Ensemble type: Chorus, with or without Solo Voices:Chorus with One Non-Keyboard Instrument
Instrumentation: ,1 Cello soloist(s)
Instrumentation notes: SATB is in counterpoint to the cello so almost a cappella