Ravinia 2024 Issue 1

Terry Riley’s Kiss Yo’ Ass Goodbye , created in collaboration with Sara Miyamoto, utilizes Sun Ra’s track “Nuclear War” as source material and inspiration. Riley’s composed this remix through keyboard improvisations, which was then translated for string quartet by Kronos cel- list Paul Wiancko. This remix was created for the Red Hot + Ra series—a large-scale, multi-album multimedia series featuring many artists offer- ing their interpretations of and tributes to the music of Sun Ra. Illustrating Sun Ra’s profound influence on contemporary culture around the world, the series also aims to raise awareness about climate justice. Kiss Yo’ Ass Goodbye will be part of the Red Hot + Ra album curated by Kronos’s David Harrington, which will be re- leased in 2024. Sun Ra, Terry Riley, and Sara Miyamoto’s Kiss Yo’ Ass Goodbye , arranged by Paul Wiancko, was commissioned for the Kronos Quartet by Carn- egie Hall, Kronos Performing Arts Association, and Red Hot. STACY GARROP (b. 1969) Glorious Mahalia Stacy Garrop is a freelance composer whose music is centered on dramatic and lyrical story- telling. Garrop has received the Barlow Prize, a Fromm Music Foundation grant, three Barlow Endowment commissions, and the Sackler Mu- sic Composition Prize, along with prizes from competitions sponsored by the Detroit Sympho- ny Orchestra, Civic Orchestra of Chicago, Oma- ha Symphony, New England Philharmonic, Bos- ton Choral Ensemble, Utah Arts Festival, and Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble. Theodore Presser Company publishes her chamber and orchestral works; she self-publishes her choral pieces under Inkjar Publishing Company. She is a recording artist with Cedille Records with pieces on twelve CDs; her works are also commercially available on more than a dozen Stacy Garrop additional labels. In 2022–23, she served as the featured composer of the Bowling Green State University New Music Festival, Indiana State University Contemporary Music Festival, and the University of Texas at San Antonio NewMu- sic Festival, with additional guest residencies at Michigan State University, Florida State Univer- sity, and the University of Colorado at Boulder. She also served as a mentor composer for the Cabrillo Conductors/Composers Workshop, LunART Festival Composers Hub, and the Toul- min Foundation. Garrop is an ongoing mentor for Chicago a cappella’s HerVoice Emerging Women Choral Composers Competition. About Glorious Mahalia , Garrop writes: Louis “Studs” Terkel, the Pulitzer Prize-winning writer and oral historian, hosted a daily nation- ally syndicated radio broadcast show from Chi- cago’s WFMT station from 1952 to 1997. Studs’ curious, inquisitive nature led him to interview people from all walks of life over the course of his career. For WFMT alone, he conducted over 5,000 interviews. Before he worked for WFMT, Studs had a radio program called “The Wax Mu- seum” on WENR in Chicago. It was on this ra- dio network that Studs first featured the glorious voice of Mahalia Jackson. Studs heard Mahalia sing for the first time around 1946. He was in a record store in Chi- cago when Mahalia’s voice rang out over the store’s speakers. Studs was captivated; he had to meet the woman who possessed that remarkable voice. At that time, Mahalia was gaining fame as a singer of gospels and spirituals in Black church- es both within Chicago and out of it, as she did a fair amount of touring around the country. Out- side of these Black communities, however, Ma- halia wasn’t yet known. With a little sleuthing, Studs discovered where she regularly sang, at the Greater Salem Baptist Church on the South Side of Chicago. Studs went to the church, introduced himself to Mahalia, and invited her to sing on his radio program. Studs and Mahalia developed a close friendship over the ensuing decades, and they occasionally worked together profession- ally. As Mahalia rose to international fame and became known as the greatest gospel singer of her time, she and Studs never lost contact. In researching WFMT’s Studs Terkel Radio Ar- chive, I found several broadcasts when Studs featured Mahalia Jackson and her recordings on his show. Two broadcasts in particular stood out. The first broadcast occurred in 1963, when the pair sat down for a conversation that covered a wide range of topics, including Mahalia’s expe- riences of working in the South, the continuing hardships she faces being a woman of color, and the civil rights efforts of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Reverend Ralph Abernathy, and many others (including Mahalia, who was a staunch support- er of Dr. King). The second broadcast dates from 1957; it features Mahalia performing a number of gospels and spirituals for a live audience at a hotel in Chicago. In crafting my composition, I decided to highlight many of the salient points of Studs’ and Mahalia’s 1963 discussion, with a musical performance from the 1957 concert fea- tured prominently in the work. Glorious Mahalia consists of five movements. In movement 1, Mahalia discusses the origin and meaning of the spiritual Hold on. In Stave in the ground (movement 2), she and Studs talk about the work she did when living in the South, and the continuing prejudice she faces. This is followed by a more heated discussion between Studs and Mahalia in Are you being treated right (movement 3). The fourth movement features Mahalia’s soulful performance of the spiritual Sometime I feel like a motherless child . The piece concludes with This world will make you think (movement 5), in which Mahalia speaks of her hope that we can unite as one nation. Kronos Quartet commissioned Glorious Ma- halia for Carnegie Hall’s The 60’s: The Years That Changed America concert series. I wish to thank Kronos Quartet’s violinist David Harrington for suggesting Mahalia Jackson’s interviews with Studs Terkel as the topic for the piece, as well as Tony Macaluso, Director of the WFMT Radio Network and the Studs Terkel Radio Archive, and Allison Schein, Archivist for the Studs Terkel Radio Archive, for their help in locating and se- curing my chosen broadcasts within the Archive. Voice of Studs Terkel courtesy of the Estate of Studs Terkel. Voice of Mahalia Jackson courtesy of the Estate of Mahalia Jackson. Studs Terkel Radio Archive, courtesy Chicago History Muse- um and WFMT Radio Network. Stacy Garrop’s Glorious Mahalia was commis- sioned for the Kronos Quartet by Carnegie Hall, with support from David Harrington Research and Development Fund. JLIN (b. 1987) Little Black Book Arranged by Jacob Garchik (b. 1976) A math lover, former steel factory worker, and proud resident of Gary, IN, Jlin has risen to be- come one of the most distinctive composers in America and one of the most influential women in electronic music. Jlin’s introduction to pro- ducing music stems from Chicago footwork, but diverse influences ranging from Igor Stravinsky and Philip Glass to Miles Davis and Eartha Kitt give Jlin’s complex, percussion-driven work a sophisticated polyrhythmic sound all its own. Her albums Dark Energy (2015) and Black Ori- gami (2017) received critical acclaim and have been featured “best of ” in the New York Times , The Wire , Rolling Stone , and others. Referencing a wide range of musical movements and tech- niques, Jlin’s collaborations with contemporary artists are just as relevant to her practice, as ex- emplified by “JSLOIPNIE,” the product of Jlin RAVINIA.ORG  • RAVINIAMAGAZINE 67