Rising – Smith, Why did they all shout
Kile Smith – “Why did they all shout”
from The Arc in the Sky
Sunrise, Wednesday April 22
hit it!
higher
and higher
and higher:
Skip the caffeine – this one will wake you without it!
Though we have composing friends all over the world, Philadelphia composers have written more music for us than others. It hasn’t been a conscious effort on our part, it’s just that Philadelphia is rich in gifted composers. Though, perhaps there is something to hearing us live and understanding the somewhat-strange Event that is a concert of The Crossing. Is it a Classical Music performance, a family reunion, theatre, new-music experiment, a liturgy?
Prom?
No one has written more music for us than Kile Smith. But, not until we had an inspiring conversation with a generous commissioning friend did we get the idea to have a full concert-length work from Kile, just for us. Bare. Unaccompanied. (Although, those Vespers, commissioned by Piffaro for “them and us,” is a pretty nifty piece.)
Kile knew that the poetry of Robert Lax would appeal to us. It references the spiritual but often skirts the divine; it incorporates Eastern thinking; it embraces simple things, told in small parcels. In fact, Lax inadvertently helped launch a minimalist movement in poetry.
“Why did they all shout,” the first movement of The Arc in the Sky, is among the most raucous and yet compact works written for us; it demonstrates Kile’s intimate knowledge of ‘what we do well’ and exploits a certain kind of energy that we really love to (in fact long to) conjure together. It’s an unusual journey in jazz, but with a keen awareness of how to get voices “there.”
Kile writes:
"To Lax, jazz was a metaphor of life, a communal improvisation with others and with God. I open the work with 'Why did they all shout,' capturing, I hoped, the ecstasy of performers and listeners being carried along together. Some features echo jazz: close and parallel harmonies, a kind of syncopation through changing meters and twos-against- threes, a walking bass."
to be that high
is to be at one
with the source
of all true
blessings
Why do we love to sing this?
Kile.
And Louis Armstrong.
Poetry.
And music.
It just all comes together with explosive energy, right out of the gate, commencing a work that will have us singing for over an hour. It feels as if Kile gifted us a piece – our piece – that represents, that feels like, the single phrase that lies at the root and motivation of all musicians:
Listen to me.
- The Whole Team @ The Crossing
The Arc in the Sky
I. Jazz
1. Why did they all shout
music by Kile Smith
words by Robert Lax
recorded live in concert at The Month of Moderns
June 30, 2018 at The Presbyterian Church of Chestnut Hill
audio by Paul Vazquez of Digital Mission Audio Services
commissioned by The Crossing and Donald Nally with the generous support of an anonymous donor and recorded for Navona Records with the continuing support of that donor.
video art by Paul du Coudray
* * *
why did they
all shout:
louis
is de
lawd?
because
there was something
prophetic
about his trumpeting:
to be that right
is to be at one
with the source
of all good
things
hit it!
higher
and higher
and higher:
to be that high
is to be at one
with the source
of all true
blessings
that is why they shouted
when louis hit the
high notes:
they thought
the roof
would open
and the angels
would burst in