Stepping Into The Batter's Box
Robert Paterson
About this work:
Stepping Into The Batter's Box, He Hears His Father's Voice is my second song cycle written in collaboration with Bridget Meeds, a poet, and Kenny Berkowitz, a journalist. The first project we worked on together was Thursday, a song cycle for soprano and piano in which the text consists of fictitious answering machine messages. This time, we specifically decided to tackle a subject that we thought would entice people into the concert hall that might not normally attend. Their text is loosely based on the life of baseball giant Mike Piazza of the New York Mets. Each movement represents a different phase of the game, and thoughts of Piazza's father also tie everything together. I interpret this work as being less about Piazza the individual and more about the all-American baseball player. The common musical thread through each movement is a tonally ambiguous whole tone scale.
Year composed: 2005
Duration: 00:18:00
Ensemble type: Chamber or Jazz Ensemble, Without Voice:Keyboard plus One Instrument
Instrumentation: 1 Piano, 1 Tenor