#4591, George Crumb: Night Music

“No one wrote ‘Night Music’ quite like the late George Crumb,” opines host John Schaefer. Hear some of George Crumb’s nocturnal moments including his amplified string quartet, Black Angels, Dream Sequence, and Eine Kleine Mitternachtmusik.

George Crumb, who died in 2022 at the age of 92, “was an American composer who broke all kinds of molds. In the 1960s, at a time when contemporary classical music was largely academic and cerebral, Crumb pursued his own path, characterized by a love of unusual textures and – unusually for the time – a social or political subtext.” (John Schaefer)

Hear Crumb’s 1970 piece Black Angels, for electric string quartet and bits of percussion, which was a response to the Vietnam War, full of haunting glassy sonorities (wine glasses were used to create a drone) and terrifying explosions of skittering, insect-like noise. Kronos Quartet, which has revolutionized the look and sound of the string quartet in the past half century, was formed specifically to play Black Angels. (John Schaefer)

Also, listen to George Crumb's work Eine Kleine Mitternachtmusik – “a little midnight music,” the title a play on Mozart’s Eine kleine Nachtmusick (“a little night music”) built around Thelonious Monk's famous tune ‘Round Midnight. This is just one of Crumb’s masterpieces for solo piano, which he found an almost inexhaustible resource for new sounds: strumming the strings, laying sheets of paper on the strings to create a rustling effect, and asking the pianist to speak, count, and rap on the body of the piano. (John Schaefer)

Then, there’s George Crumb’s eerie Dream Sequence (Images II). Written in 1976 and notated on a circular score, the work calls for violin, cello, piano, percussion, and an offstage glass harmonica that requires two players. Plus, listen to the portion of Crumb’s work, Quest, subtitled “Nocturnal.”

Program #4591, George Crumb - Night Music  (First Aired 2/09/2022)

ARTIST: Emanuele Arciuli, piano
WORK: George Crumb: Eine Kleine Mitternachtmusik [1:00]
RECORDING: Eine Kleine Mitternachtmusik
SOURCE: Bridge Records 9170
INFO: bridgerecords.com

ARTIST: Kronos Quartet
WORK: George Crumb: Black Angels III. Return [7:16]
RECORDING: Black Angels
SOURCE: Nonesuch 79242
INFO: nonesuch.com

ARTIST: Members of Orchestra 2001
WORK: George Crumb: Dream Sequence (Images II) [14:19]
RECORDING: Orchestra 2001 Plays George Crumb
SOURCE: CRI #803
INFO: newworldrecords.org

ARTIST: Emanuele Arciuli, piano
WORK: George Crumb: Eine Kleine Mitternachtmusik [21:21]
RECORDING: Eine Kleine Mitternachtmusik
SOURCE: Bridge Records 9170
INFO: bridgerecords.com

ARTIST: David Starobin, members of Speculum Musicae
WORK: George Crumb: Nocturnal, from Quest [3:33]
RECORDING: GEORGE CRUMB EDITION VOLUME 2: QUEST
SOURCE: Bridge Records 9069
INFO: bridgerecords.com