As the house light went up in Moeser Auditorium at UNC, I joined my classmates in a thunderous standing ovation, while still in awe of the music I had just heard. What followed was a reception hosted by UNC’s Department of Music, as we celebrated the remarkable career of Professor Allen Anderson, the composer of all of the evening’s pieces. As a high school student and composition enthusiast myself, I am very fortunate and honored to be among Anderon’s last students during his 26 years at Carolina, before his retirement at the end of this semester.
This concert Oct. 29, 2022, was a tribute to him, as the university recognizes his commitment to renovating the department while cultivating the next generations of artists and composers at Carolina. The intriguing program featured seven of Anderson’s most recent works, four of which are world premieres, with performers consisting of faculty, students and alumni from UNC, Duke, NCCU, ECU and UNC-G.
The concert opened with his solo piano piece “3 Alessandras with Lullaby,” with “Alessandras” referring to his grandniece Alessandra. In these sets of three fanciful variations on a lullaby he wrote for the birth of Alessandra, Anderson utilizes the piano to its full capacity through dazzling disjunct arpeggiations, which are perfectly executed by pianist Robert Buxton.
The next piece, written as a surprise to celebrate UNC Professor Emeritus and flutist Brooks de Wetter-Smith’s 80th birthday, is “Evidence of Signs” for solo flute. Although Smith is not able to perform the piece live due to health issues, we are blessed with a fantastic pre-recorded performance. The most charming feature of this work is how the thematic material develops throughout the piece, and eventually bends into a cryptogrammatic passage, or motto, that embeds Smith’s initials.
Teachers and students are usually said to harbor a “mutualistic relationship,” as teachers are often inspired by their students, who in turn inspire them. This relationship is perfectly reflected in the next piece, “In Your Narrowing Dark Hours” for voice and piano, which derived from a demo he wrote for his Theory III class last semester that I’m a part of. Like the solo flute piece, this one is also written for an amazing musician at Carolina— mezzo-soprano Julia Holoman, who along with pianist Mimi Soloman, puts on a performance that presents the melancholy lyricism of the piece at its best.
After a brief intermission, the second half starts with a piece unlike any other—written initially for a cello quartet, “Momento after Fernando Franco” is performed by an astonishing ensemble of nine cellos under the baton of Tonu Kalam, conducting professor at UNC. The work, inspired by the contrapuntal texture of 16th-century Mexican composer Fernando Franco, was written to commemorate the loss of some of Anderson’s loved ones in 2021.
Immediately following that, the audience are being fully immersed in the visuals created by the inimitable Tama Hochbaum, an artist and Anderson’s wife, for his electronic piece “cym bow lick garden.” The title, which sounds much like “symbolic garden,” refers to Hochbaum’s video content based on her backyard. The main ingredients of the audio include a cymbal, a bowed cello, and an electric guitar lick, which are also reflected through the title.
In “Think That’s You,” a piano toccata written for the Head of Keyboard Studies Clara Yang, Anderson explores the fundamental question of the relationship between music and technology through yet another of his masterful piano writing, as he uses harmony to navigate through the kaleidoscopic textures.
The concert concludes with perhaps one of Anderson’s most well-recognized pieces, “This Night, This Moment,” which was commissioned by the department back in 2007 to be played at graduations. It has been brought to life once again by the phenomenal UNC Chamber Singers conducted by Susan Klebanow. The acapella, set on Li Po’s poem about departing, reminded us once again of Anderson’s retirement and his contributions to the department over the past three decades.
“There is a cool thing about music, and Allen Anderson is listening, teaching, and composing in search of it,” wrote Andrea Bohlman, Director of Graduate Studies, in the concert’s program note. Indeed, he always seems to be guiding us to discover the “cool thing” in music during my time studying with him. And after that night and that moment Oct. 29, a new search seems to have just begun.
Photo by Richard Li/The ECHO
