CLAY JUG
Edie Hill
The Crossing | Donald Nally Conductor
OVERVIEW
The choral music of Minnesota-based composer Edie Hill shines on CLAY JUG, a compendium of large and small works for a cappella choir and choir accompanied by chamber ensemble. Though the works featured on CLAY JUG vary in scope, they all demonstrate Hill’s keen sensitivity to ensemble texture and harmonic density, as well as the incorporation of text across four languages.
In CLAY JUG, Hill excels at shifting the listener’s perspective as they listen to the choir. In the most straightforward cases, such as in The Fenix, Hill moves the choir in between the music’s foreground and background to accommodate a vocal soloist. More dramatic is what happens in From the Wingbone of the Swan and “Clay Jug” – an excerpt from a large work of Hill’s entitled A Sound Like This – wherein three or four musical layers converse within the choir itself, or between the choir and accompanying instruments.
It is obvious in the works on CLAY JUG that Hill has a strong connection to the texts she sets. Three of the album’s works – The Fenix, Alma beata et Bella and Cancion de el Alma – draw their texts from very old European sources dating back to the 10th, 15th and 16th centuries, respectively. Hill does not necessarily modernize these ancient words in her settings of them, but she succeeds in meaningfully personalizing them through her musical language.
Along these lines, Hill describes the influence of the language these works’ texts on their aesthetics, particularly in the case of The Fenix, which uses its poetry’s original medieval Anglo-Saxon language. Similarly, Alma beata et Bella seems to make homage to Renaissance-era musical tropes contemporaneous to its text’s origins, but, in both works, Hill’s individual voice comes through with only slight alteration.
The works on CLAY JUG feature a musical language that pairs beautifully with choir, employing dissonance with care and purpose, as well as freely shifting texture to serve Hill’s compositional designs.
HIGHLIGHTS
CLAY JUG demonstrates the composer’s keen ability to shift seamlessly between four different languages and mold her compositional voice to the particular characteristics of each
From the Wingbone of the Swan is the only work to feature accompanied choir, which makes it an important point of comparison with the other pieces on the album
Through her lectures and workshops, Hill actively cultivates the talents of young composers and musicians as well as educating and engaging the public in the music of today. She was Composer in Residence at St. Paul’s The Schubert Club from 2005-2017 where she ran and grew the Composer Mentorship Program for gifted high school composers
A three-time McKnight Artist Fellow and a two-time Bush Artist Fellow, Hill has received grants and awards from the Jerome Foundation, the Minnesota State Arts Board, Meet The Composer, ASCAP, and Chamber Music America
ALSO ON NAVONA
(
NV5989) MOONSTRUNG AIR
Gregory W. Brown
The Crossing
CREDITS
Recorded July 13-15 2016 at The High Point at St. Peter’s Church
in the Great Valley in Malvern PA
Recording Session Producer Jeff LeRoy
Recording Session Engineer Eugene Lew
Executive Producer Bob Lord
Executive A&R Sam Renshaw
A&R Brandon MacNeil
Audio Director Jeff LeRoy
Engineering Manager Lucas Paquette
Editing, Mixing & Mastering Nate Hunter
Art & Production Director Brett Picknell
Graphic Design Emily Roulo
Marketing Scott Murphy
Release Date February 10, 2017
Catalog #: NV6073
TRACK LISTING
Edie Hill composer
The Crossing • Donald Nally conductor
From the Wingbone of a Swan
Edie Hill & Timothy O’Brien, text
1 i. Prelude to Speech
2 ii. Source
3 iii. Paleolithic Flute
4 The Fenix
Text from the Exeter Book
5 Cancion de el alma: en una noche escura
San Juan de la Cruz, text
6 Clay Jug
Kabir, text; VERSIONS by Robert Bly
7 We Bloomed in Spring
St. Teresa of Ávila, text; translated by Daniel Ladinsky
8 Alma Beata et Bella
Jacopo Sannazaro, text
The Crossing
Katy Avery
Jessica Beebe
Julie Bishop
Kelly Ann Bixby
Karen Blanchard
Steven Bradshaw
Maren Brehm
Jeffrey Cutts
Colin Dill
Micah Dingler
Robert Eisentrout
Ryan Fleming
Joanna Gates
Dimitri German
Steven Hyder
Michael Jones
Heather Kayan
Heidi Kurtz
Frank Mitchell
Rebecca Myers
Rebecca Oehlers
James Reese
Dan Schwartz
Rebecca Siler
Ted Babcock, percussion
Arlen Hlusko, cello
Mimi Stillman, flute
Cancion de el alma: Maren Montalbano, soloist
The Fenix: Kelly Ann Bixby, soloist; additional solos
by Jessica Beebe, Rebecca Myers, Karen Blanchard,
and Michael Jones
The Crossing Staff
Managing Director Steven Gearhart
Marketing and Artistic Associate Kevin Krasinski
Production Coordinator James Reese
Rehearsal Pianist John Grecia
Interns Gabrielle Barkidjija & Kevin Vondrak
Special thanks to the Presbyterian Church of Chestnut Hill for providing our rehearsal space. -The Crossing
My special thanks to Donald Nally and The Crossing for their exquisite musicianship, to Ted, Arlen and Mimi for their beautiful work on From The Wingbone of a Swan, to the PARMA team and all of the people who so generously contributed to this project, to Dale Warland, Paul Gerike, Regina Stroncek, and Christopher Johnston.
Clay Jug is dedicated to my parents, James Donald Hill and Alice Wells Hill who have encouraged and inspired me to create music all of my life. My love and gratitude are immeasurable. -Edie Hill
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