top of page

Friction Presents

The Highwayman

Mar 17 & 18, 2023
7:30 p.m.
Grace Cathedral  & St. Mark's Episcopal

Goethe Lieder

Mignon I

Mignon II

Mignon III

Mignon: Kennst du das Land?

 

To Unpathed Waters, Undreamed Shores

I. Pelagic Within

II. Dream of Xerxes Blue

III. Central Park Microbial

IV. Invisible Eviction

V. Crying, Together

VI. Follow the Water

VII. Rise Up

 

 

The Highwayman

Harp and Altar

Hugo Wolf (1860-1903)

 

 

 

 

 

Michi Wiancko (b. 1976)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Noah Luna (b. 1984)

Missy Mazzoli (b. 1980)

Intermission

Performers:

Friction Quartet

Otis Harriel - Violin

Kevin Rogers - Violin

Mitso Floor - Viola

Doug Machiz - Cello

Cara Gabrielson - Soprano

Friction Quartet, whose performances have been called “stunningly passionate” (Calgary Herald) and “exquisitely skilled” (ZealNYC), exists to modernize the chamber music experience and expand the string quartet repertoire. Friction achieves this mission by commissioning new works, curating imaginative programs, collaborating with artists, and presenting interactive educational outreach. Joshua Kosman (San Francisco Chronicle) declared that Friction Quartet is, “The Bay Area's redoubtable new-music ensemble.”

 

Since forming in 2011, Friction has commissioned fifty works for string quartet and given countless world premiere performances. To support their mission of commissioning new music, they developed the Friction Commissioning Initiative to work together with their audience to fund specific commissions. Since 2017, they have raised $20,000 that has funded eleven new works, including five by young composers between the ages of sixteen and twenty-one. In the past few years, they have been awarded commissioning  grants from Chamber Music America and Intermusic SF. They have received additional grant support from IntermusicSF, Zellerbach Family Foundation, and the California Arts Council.

 

Friction has held residencies at the New Music for Strings Festival in Denmark, Interlochen Arts Camp, Lunenburg Academy of Music, Napa Valley Performing Arts Center, Old First Concerts, San Francisco Friends of Chamber Music, and was the first ensemble in residence at the Center for New Music. They are ensemble educators with SF Symphony’s Adventures in Music Program, KDFC Playground Pop Ups, and more.

 

Friction appears on recordings with National Sawdust Tracks, Innova Records, Albany Records, and Pinna Records. Their recent albums include Rising, featuring three commissioned quartets about the changing climate and the landscapes of California, and Counter Paint, a collaborative multimedia project created by Pascal Le Boeuf and Danny Clay. They released their full-length debut album, resolve, in 2018. 

 

Friction Quartet won Second Prize in the 2016 Schoenfeld Competition, were quarter-finalists in the 2015 Fischoff Competition, and placed second at the 2015 Frances Walton Competition

program notes

Program Notes

Goethe Lieder - Hugo Wolf (1860-1903)

 

Between October 1888 and February 1889 Hugo Wolf composed all 51 of his Goethe songs, venturing into areas of the poet’s protean output unexplored by previous composers. This was partly due to Wolf’s refusal to treat a poem that he felt had been set once and for all by Schubert—hence no “Gretchen am Spinnrade” or “Geheimes.”

 

But he had no qualms about tackling the songs from Goethe’s semi autobiographical novel Wilhelm Meisters Lehrjahre. The four songs presented tonight are sung by the tragic character Mignon an enigmatic outsider who haunted the Romantic imagination.

In setting the songs of Mignon, Wolf stressed that, unlike Schubert and Schumann, he sought to go beyond the verses to portray the characters as they appear in the novel: i.e., as abnormal and unhinged. And he does this above all through a wandering chromaticism.

 

The first three Mignon songs combine this chromaticism with fragile textures, suggesting both the waif’s innocence and her deep underlying grief. But in “Kennst du das Land” no trace of her childlike innocence remains: this magnificent song is composed on an operatic scale, moving from quiet reflection through mounting ecstasy to a climax of feverish, hysterical abandon.


- Notes by Richard Wigmore

To Unpathed Waters, Undreamed Shores - Michi Wiancko (b. 1976)

Movement 1: Pelagic Within – Our journey begins on the water, as we travel from shoreline to open sea.
 

Movement 2: Dream of the Xerces Blue – Dedicated to the magic of pollinators specifically to the gossamer-winged butterfly, Xerces Blue, which became extinct after loss of its coastal sand dune habitat in San Francisco’s Sunset District. It was last spotted in the Bay area in 1943.

Movement 3: Central Park Microbial – A tribute to the microbiome of the soil beneath New York City’s Central Park, discovered only in recent years to be shockingly diverse and resilient. The vast majority of the park’s microbes have yet to be studied or even named.


Movement 4: Invisible Eviction – The world is on fire.


Movement 5: Crying, Together A song of mourning dedicated to our most vulnerable populations.


Movement 6: Follow the Water – A return to the ocean, and the rivers that flow into it.


Movement 7: Rise Up – A celebration, a call to action, and a meditation on our collective humanity.

To Unpathed Waters, Undreamed Shores, a multi-movement work for string quartet, celebrates the beauty and vitality of the natural world, suggesting hope and inspiration as humanity addresses fears and worries for our planet. The central themes of regeneration and resilience highlight the need to help protect each other and our most vulnerable populations.

This work was written for the Jupiter Quartet, and commissioned by Bay Chamber Concerts in celebration of the organization’s 60th anniversary, in partnership with the Krannert Center for the Performing Arts/University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. 

 

- Michi Wiancko

The Highwayman - Noah Luna (b. 1984)

 

This piece was one of the first commissioned by Friction Quartet, in early 2013. Written by long time friend of the quartet, Noah Luna, it was originally written for Tenor and String Quartet. The version you will hear tonight will be performed by Soprano and String Quartet.

This piece uses text from Alfred Noyes famous romantic ballad, The Highwayman. Published in 1906, this ballad is considered one of the best English ballads to be written especially in terms of oral delivery. Using such vivid imagery , repetition and alliteration, the poem musically jumps of the page when recited. 

The ballad was completed in two days and almost half a century later, Noyes wrote, "I think the success of the poem... was because it was not an artificial composition, but was written at an age when I was genuinely excited by that kind of romantic story."

The text has been adapted for this music by singer-songwriter, Tom Woodward. Expertly set to music by Noah, the music reflects the text perfectly. Using techniques of sound-painting and motifs in the music, the result is a tightly composed circular piece of music that brings you on a journey worthy of the ballad.

- Notes by Otis Harriel

Harp and Altar - Missy Mazzoli (b. 1980)

 

Harp and Altar was commissioned by the Kronos Quartet. At its core, this piece is a love song to the Brooklyn Bridge. The title comes from a poem by Hart Crane, in which he describes the Brooklyn Bridge as “that harp and altar of the Fury fused”. The Borough of Brooklyn is impossible to describe, but the Brooklyn Bridge seems to be an apt symbol for its vastness, its strength and its history.

 

Halfway through the work the vocalist Gabriel Kahane’s pre-recorded voice enters, singing fragments of these lines from Crane’s poem, The Bridge: Through the bound cable strands, the arching path upward, veering with light, the flight of strings, taut miles of shuttling moonlight syncopate the whispered rush, telepathy of wires.

 

- Missy Mazzoli

Lyrics

lyrics

Goethe Lieder - Hugo Wolf (1860-1903)

Lyricist - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832)

Translation - Richard Stokes

 

Mignon I

Heiss’ mich nicht reden, heiss’ mich schweigen,

Denn mein Geheimnis ist mir Pflicht;

Ich möchte dir mein ganzes Innre zeigen,

Allein das Schicksal will es nicht.

 

Zur rechten Zeit vertreibt der Sonne Lauf

Die finstre Nacht, und sie muss sich erhellen;

Der harte Fels schliesst seinen Busen auf,

Missgönnt der Erde nicht die tief verborgnen Quellen.

 

Ein Jeder sucht im Arm des Freundes Ruh,

Dort kann die Brust in Klagen sich ergiessen;

Allein ein Schwur drückt mir die Lippen zu,

Und nur ein Gott vermag sie aufzuschliessen.

Mignon II

Nur wer die Sehnsucht kennt

Weiss, was ich leide!

Allein und abgetrennt

Von aller Freude,

Seh’ ich an’s Firmament

Nach jener Seite.

Ach! der mich liebt und kennt

Ist in der Weite.

Es schwindelt mir, es brennt

Mein Eingeweide.

Nur wer die Sehnsucht kennt

Weiss, was ich leide!

Mignon III

So lasst mich scheinen, bis ich werde,

Zieht mir das weisse Kleid nicht aus!

Ich eile von der schönen Erde

Hinab in jenes feste Haus.

 

Dort ruh’ ich eine kleine Stille,

Dann öffnet sich der frische Blick;

Ich lasse dann die reine Hülle,

Den Gürtel und den Kranz zurück.

 

Und jene himmlischen Gestalten,

Sie fragen nicht nach Mann und Weib,

Und keine Kleider, keine Falten

Umgeben den verklärten Leib.

 

Zwar lebt’ ich ohne Sorg’ und Mühe,

Doch fühlt’ ich tiefen Schmerz genung.

Vor Kummer altert’ ich zu frühe;

Macht mich auf ewig wieder jung!

Mignon (Kennst du das Land?)

Kennst du das Land, wo die Zitronen blühn,

Im dunkeln Laub die Gold-Orangen glühn,

Ein sanfter Wind vom blauen Himmel weht,

Die Myrte still und hoch der Lorbeer steht?

Kennst du es wohl?

Dahin! Dahin

Möcht’ ich mit dir, o mein Geliebter, ziehn.

 

Kennst du das Haus? Auf Säulen ruht sein Dach;

Es glänzt der Saal, es schimmert das Gemach,

Und Marmorbilder stehn und sehn mich an:

Was hat man dir, du armes Kind, getan?

Kennst du es wohl?

Dahin! Dahin

Möcht’ ich mit dir, o mein Beschützer, ziehn.

 

Kennst du den Berg und seinen Wolkensteg?

Das Maultier sucht im Nebel seinen Weg;

In Höhlen wohnt der Drachen alte Brut;

Es stürzt der Fels und über ihn die Flut!

Kennst du ihn wohl?

Dahin! dahin

Geht unser Weg! O Vater, laß uns ziehn!

 

 

 

 

Mignon I

Bid me not speak, bid me be silent,

For I am bound to secrecy;

I should love to bare you my soul,

But Fate has willed it otherwise.

 

At the appointed time the sun dispels

The dark, and night must turn to day;

The hard rock opens up its bosom,

Does not begrudge earth its deeply hidden springs.

 

All humans seek peace in the arms of a friend,

There the heart can pour out its sorrow;

But my lips, alas, are sealed by a vow,

And only a god can open them.

Mignon II

Only those who know longing

Know what I suffer!

Alone and cut off

From every joy,

I search the sky

In that direction.

Ah! he who loves and knows me

Is far away.

My head reels,

My body blazes.

Only those who know longing

Know what I suffer!
 

Mignon III

Let me appear an angel till I become one;

Do not take my white dress from me!

I hasten from the beautiful earth

Down to that impregnable house.

 

There in brief repose I’ll rest,

Then my eyes will open, renewed;

My pure raiment then I’ll leave,

With girdle and rosary, behind.

 

And those heavenly beings,

They do not ask who is man or woman,

And no garments, no folds

Cover the transfigured body.

 

Though I lived without trouble and toil,

I have felt deep pain enough.

I grew old with grief before my time;

O make me forever young again!

Mignon (Do you know the Land?

Do you know the land where the lemons blossom,

Where oranges grow golden among dark leaves,

A gentle wind drifts from the blue sky,

The myrtle stands silent, the laurel tall,

Do you know it?

It is there, it is there

I long to go with you, my love.

 

Do you know the house? Columns support its roof;

Its great hall gleams, its apartments shimmer,

And marble statues stand and stare at me:

What have they done to you, poor child?

Do you know it?

It is there, it is there

I long to go with you, my protector.

 

Do you know the mountain and its cloudy path?

The mule seeks its way through the mist,

Caverns house the dragons’ ancient brood;

The rock falls sheer, the torrent over it!

Do you know it?

It is there, it is there

Our pathway lies! O father, let us go!

The Highwayman

Part I

The wind was dark among the trees 

The moon a ghost upon the seas 

a moonlit road cut by the moor 

and the Highwayman came riding 

 

The Highwayman rode to the tavern door 

His hatted head and collared chin 

Velvet coat and brown doeskin 

His unwrinkled boots up to his thigh 

His gun and dagger, mirrored sky, 

the starred and cloudless windy sky. 

 

He stumbled on the tavern yard 

Tapped at windows locked and barred 

The landlord's black-eyed daughter heard 

Bess, the landlord's daughter 

With a rose red love-knot in her black hair. 

And in the yard the gate it creaked 

The stableman froze, attention piqued 

He loved the landlord's daughter 

The landlord's red lipped daughter 

And quietly he listen'd and heard the robber say 

 

“I'll be rich by morning light. 

But if they come, for me they prey. 

I'll come to you by moonlight 

though hell should bar the way."  

 

Her hair was free her vision vast  

In the fading light, disappearing fast  

He swallowed the scent of the girl 

whose bloom was a face of beauty and sweet perfume 

He rode to the west in the unlit night. 

Part II

At dawn and noon and sunset too  

Until the rise of tomorrow's moon 

Instead of him came a purple moor  

Soldiers came marching, marching, marching

The king's men came marching to the tavern door. 

 

They didn't speak, they drank instead 

And tied the daughter to the bed 

With guns in wait at her window 

Her skin as white as settled snow 

She was bait by her window  

 

They perched her up to see the view 

And pressed a gun against her too 

"But if they come, for me they prey. 

I'll come to you by moonlight though hell should bar the way."  

 

She twisted hands against the knots 

In vain they turned to bloody spots 

Stretched and strained through crawling time 

Till at midnight's stroke she touched the trigger  

The trigger at last was hers 

 

That's all she needed to caress 

With muzzle pressed beneath her breast 

She didn't risk detection she stood up to attention  

And watched the road in moonlight  

The blood of her veins in moonlight 

 

The horse's hooves resounded like a heartbeat in the air 

A pulsing in the distance; were they deaf and did not hear? 

Over the crested hill, The Highwayman came riding 

The soldiers stood there, still pulsing in the silence, the beating of the night 

Near he came towards her 

 

Her eyes were wide in mourning, he hesitated then   

A shot rang out in warning he stalled outside her den 

She shattered into moonlight and warned him with her death 

He turned and vanished westward unaware of who was there 

she died over the musket drenched in rose-red blood.  

 

The ensuing dawn he heard the news; his face grew grey to hear 

That Bess, the landlord's daughter, had died for his escape. 

Back he rode, impassioned shrieking a the sky 

The road ablaze behind him, he raised his dagger high  

 

They shot him on the highway 

He fell down like a dog, a lace collar at his neck 

And now on windy winter nights 

When the moon's a ghost upon the seas and a road cuts by the moor 

the Highwayman comes riding 

 

The Highwayman rides to the tavern door  

He stumbles on the tavern yard and raps at windows locked and barred 

And hums a tune to her waiting there 

Bess, the landlord's daughter 

With a rose red love-knot in her black hair.

composer bios

Performer/ Composer Bios

Michi Wiancko is a composer, arranger and violinist whose work has been performed by ensembles, bands and orchestras around the world. She has collaborated with artists from across a wide musical spectrum and performed with some of the great musical artists of our time.

 

She has been commissioned by the Metropolitan Museum of Art, American Lyric Theater, On Site Opera, Ecstatic Music Festival, The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, Patricia Kopatchinskaja, Camerata Bern, The SPCO’s Liquid Music series, Aizuri Quartet, Enso Quartet, Sybarite5, East Coast Chamber Orchestra, and Metropolis Ensemble. She also composes music for short and feature-length films, commercials, and for her own band, Kono Michi.

Michi’s first opera, Murasaki’s Moon premiered at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in May of 2019. This work created in collaboration with librettist Deborah Brevoort and director Eric Einhorn from OnSite Opera. Michi is a 2018 recipient of an Opera America Commissioning Grant.

Upcoming projects include new compositions for yMusic and NOW Ensemble, and arrangements and reimaginings for Camerata Bern, violinist Patricia Kopatchinskaja, soprano Anna Prohaska, and violinist Anne Akiko Meyers.

“Wiancko played to the brilliant hilt. She tossed off the dizzying demands with extraordinary confidence and focus. Her sound remained shimmering, whether she was walking technical tightropes or sending songful lines aloft.”

— The Cleveland Plain Dealer

A passionate collaborator and performer, Michi has been fortunate to work with artists across a vast musical spectrum: Missy Mazzoli, Steve Reich, Silkroad, Yo-Yo Ma, Wye Oak, Emily Wells, Laurie Anderson, William Brittelle, Daniel Wohl,

Photo credit: Anja Schütz Emanuel Ax, Patricia Kopatchinskaja, Judd Greenstein, David T. Little, Gabriela Lena Frank, Vijay Iyer, International Contemporary Ensemble, The Knights, A Far Cry, Alarm Will Sound, Mark Morris Dance Group, and the East Coast Chamber Orchestra, among others.

Described by Gramophone Magazine as an "alluring soloist with heightened expressive and violinistic gifts,” Michi gave her violin solo debuts with the New York Philharmonic and the Los Angeles Philharmonic, performed her recital debut in Weill Hall, and released a solo album of works by Émile Sauret on Naxos. More recently, she recorded two different projects for Nonesuch Records: a new string quartet composed by Laurie Anderson, and a new work by Steve Reich entitled “Pulse” with the International Contemporary Ensemble, which they performed in Carnegie Hall as part of Steve Reich’s 80th birthday celebration.

A native of California, Michi shares her time between New York and Gill, a small farming community in western Massachusetts, where she and her husband, composer Judd Greenstein have created a music festival and artistic retreat at their home - 100 acre hilltop former dairy farm, Antenna Cloud Farm.

“The very model of a modern, cool composer,” Noah Luna enjoys a whirlwind career: composing original concert music, writing orchestrations for pop, rock, and hip hop artists, conducting orchestras and for live concerts and recordings, and advocating for young musicians to become more involved in contemporary music.

 

Noah has been Young Artist-in-Residence with the Berkeley Symphony through their “Under Construction Project” (Now: Earshot), editor and arranger for San Francisco Chamber Orchestra’s Incredible Shrinking Orchestra Project arranging massive works for 14 players of the SFCO, and continues to foster relationships with his ever-expanding community’s finest ensembles.

 

In addition to his work with popular musicians, he is orchestrator for Bollywood films, independent feature films, and two PBS Specials for Ethan Bortnick: “The Power of Music” and “Generations of Music.” Most recently, he composed and conducted orchestrations for a series of live shows for the band Streetlight Manifesto, premiering on Broadway, and is currently touring with the band Hanson, conducting the orchestra for their “String Theory” tour.

Recently deemed “one of the more consistently inventive, surprising composers now working in New York” (NY Times), “Brooklyn’s post-millennial Mozart” (Time Out NY), and praised for her “apocalyptic imagination” (Alex Ross, The New Yorker), Missy Mazzoli has had her music performed by the Kronos Quartet, LA Opera, eighth blackbird, the BBC Symphony, the Minnesota Orchestra, Scottish Opera and many others.

 

In 2018 she became, along with Jeanine Tesori, one of the first woman to receive a main stage commission from the Metropolitan Opera, and was nominated for a Grammy award in the category of “Best Classical Composition”. She is currently the Mead Composer-in-Residence at the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and from 2012-2015 was Composer-in-Residence with Opera Philadelphia.

 

Her 2018 opera Proving Up, created with longtime collaborator librettist Royce Vavrek and based on a short story by Karen Russell, is a surreal commentary on the American dream. It was commissioned and premiered by Washington National Opera, Opera Omaha and Miller Theatre, and was deemed “harrowing… a true opera for its time” by the Washington Post.

 

Her 2016 opera Breaking the Waves, commissioned by Opera Philadelphia and Beth Morrison Projects, was called “one of the best 21st-century American operas yet” by Opera News. Breaking the Waves received its European premiere at the 2019 Edinburgh Festival; future performances are planned at LA Opera, Houston Grand Opera, and the Adelaide Festival. Her next opera, The Listeners, will premiere in 2021 at the Norwegian National Opera and Opera Philadelphia. In 2016, Missy and composer Ellen Reid founded Luna Lab, a mentorship program for young female composers created in partnership with the Kaufman Music Center. Her works are published by G. Schirmer. 

Soprano, Cara Gabrielson, was a 2020 National Semifinalist in The Metropolitan Opera Laffont Competition and made her San Francisco Symphony debut as the Soprano Soloist in Bach’s Magnificat. This season she joins the roster of The Metropolitan Opera covering First Cretan Woman in Idomeneo. In 2021-22 she sang Bach cantatas with Boise Baroque Orchestra, performed a solo recital for the Oregon Bach Festival and returned to the San Francisco Symphony as the Soprano Soloist in Orff’s Carmina Burana and Distant Worlds: Music from Final Fantasy. In 2019-20 she was an Emerging Artist with Opera Idaho where she sang Galatea (Acis & Galatea) and Poussette (Manon) while covering Mimì (La bohème) and the title role in Manon. She is a graduate of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music and an alumna of the Georg Solti Accademia di Bel Canto, Opera Saratoga Young Artist Program, Tafelmusik Baroque Institute Fellowship and Houston Grand Opera's Young Artists Vocal Academy.

Friction Quartet, whose performances have been called “stunningly passionate” (Calgary Herald) and “exquisitely skilled” (ZealNYC), exists to modernize the chamber music experience and expand the string quartet repertoire. Friction achieves this mission by commissioning new works, curating imaginative programs, collaborating with artists, and presenting interactive educational outreach. Joshua Kosman (San Francisco Chronicle) declared that Friction Quartet is, “The Bay Area's redoubtable new-music ensemble.”

 

Since forming in 2011, Friction has commissioned fifty works for string quartet and given countless world premiere performances. To support their mission of commissioning new music, they developed the Friction Commissioning Initiative to work together with their audience to fund specific commissions. Since 2017, they have raised $20,000 that has funded eleven new works, including five by young composers between the ages of sixteen and twenty-one. In the past few years, they have been awarded commissioning  grants from Chamber Music America and Intermusic SF. They have received additional grant support from IntermusicSF, Zellerbach Family Foundation, and the California Arts Council.

 

Friction has held residencies at the New Music for Strings Festival in Denmark, Interlochen Arts Camp, Lunenburg Academy of Music, Napa Valley Performing Arts Center, Old First Concerts, San Francisco Friends of Chamber Music, and was the first ensemble in residence at the Center for New Music. They are ensemble educators with SF Symphony’s Adventures in Music Program, KDFC Playground Pop Ups, and more.

 

Friction appears on recordings with National Sawdust Tracks, Innova Records, Albany Records, and Pinna Records. Their recent albums include Rising, featuring three commissioned quartets about the changing climate and the landscapes of California, and Counter Paint, a collaborative multimedia project created by Pascal Le Boeuf and Danny Clay. They released their full-length debut album, resolve, in 2018. 

 

Friction Quartet won Second Prize in the 2016 Schoenfeld Competition, were quarter-finalists in the 2015 Fischoff Competition, and placed second at the 2015 Frances Walton Competition.

Join Friction Quartet for more concerts!

Program IV:

Lyric Suite

May 5 & 6

Description: Catch two mainstays of the string quartet repertoire reverently interpreted by Friction Quartet. Curated by Kevin Rogers, this concert presents two complex 20th century works that contain some of the most emotional and passionate passages of the whole quartet repertory.

bottom of page