SUmmer's Day
Instrumentation
contratenore
string quartet
Duration
15 Minutes
AWARDED
Distinction prize at Panufnik Composition Competition
Publisher
Donemus
Year
1999
The timeless echoes of love in the works of William Shakespeare have cultured the globe for centuries. With Seven Sonnets, composer Katarina Glowicka has tapped the endless wellspring of the scribe’s Sonnets of 1609. Shakespeare’s penetrating insights on love are at times transcendent, endearing and others, heart wrenching. Glowicka’s compositional interpretations traverse this dynamic spectrum of emotion, giving Shakespeare’s words the musical justice they deserve.
Composed for quartet and countertenor, with Glowicka’s trademark technological infusion, the 50-minute song cycle unfolds an evocative journey. Nearly 400 years after the sonnets’ creation, the young composer adapted 3 of the poems into Summer’s Day in 1999. She then expanded the set with 4 more selections a decade later. The experience is yours to relish now, with the full effort compiled in this album – 4 centuries in the making.
by Jason Cangialosi
Part of the CD Seven Sonnets with Rubens String Quartett and Arnon Zlotnik
PERFOMERS
Original Performer:
Kamerata Quartet
Jonathan Peter Kenny
Subsequent performers:
Rubens Quartett
Arnon Zlotink – contratenore
Recording 1 : Polish National Radio Archives
Recording 2: ARTEk Sounds – Rubens Quartet, Arnon Zlotnik
Technical notes
On request.
PRESS
We are left vulnerable within the soundscape of Glowicka’s fantastical realm. The sonnet itself carries a biblical tone, elevating professed love to a godly status. This can be interpreted in Glowicka’s transcendent arrangement, where this singular voice is liberated from the body of the quartet by technology. Glowicka, like Shakespeare, leaves us in exquisite ambiguity, at peace whether we have met our end or reached a new beginning. Perhaps it is here in this paradox, in thy soul’s thought, all naked, that we are truly free to love.