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Caroline Shaw (center) wrote her
Pulitzer Prize–winning Partita for Eight
Voices for the chorus she is a member of,
Roomful of Teeth, which performed the
work at Ravinia in March 2014.
A lot of
groups
ask for the
Partita, but
it’s pretty
much a
piece for
Roomful of
Teeth. In a
few years,
maybe I’ll
let it go.
Five years a er that transformative
moment, one of Shaw’s most recent
pieces,
Narrow Sea
, will receive its h
performance on August at Ravinia
on a concert featuring soprano Dawn
Upshaw, pianist Gilbert Kalish, and
Sō Percussion. “In my many years of
reviewing music, I had somehow failed
to see the potential of the instrumen-
tal combination of voice, piano, and
percussion quartet until a lovely Terrace
eater recital … demonstrated its mer-
its,”
Washington Post
music critic Anne
Midgette wrote in April a er hearing
these artists in the same program.
Before she won the Pulitzer in
,
Shaw had written just a handful of
works. Instead, she had devoted most
of her time to singing with Roomful of
Teeth and playing violin with the Amer-
ican Contemporary Music Ensemble,
also sitting in as a substitute with ba-
roque and contemporary groups around
New York.
On something of a lark, Shaw
submitted her Partita for Eight Voices
for Pulitzer consideration, hoping to
gain some recognition for the work but
not really believing it could win. “ e
application fee was only
, which is a
lot, but it’s half the cost of what it took
to apply to grad school,” she quips.
e piece was written expressly
for Roomful of Teeth, an eight-voice
vocal ensemble that draws on singing
Shaw saw her inbox explode—she
suddenly found herself much more
in demand as a composer and work-
ing with A-listers like soprano Reneé
Fleming, many who she had previously
only admired from afar. Recent works
have included
e Mountain at Loved
a Bird
, which was premiered in Octo-
ber by the Orchestra of St. Luke’s with
actor John Lithgow as narrator, and a
song cycle with four other composers
techniques from around the world,
ranging from Tuvan throat singing to
death growls from the heavy-metal
world. e Pulitzer website describes the
Partita as “a highly polished and inven-
tive a cappella work uniquely embrac-
ing speech, whispers, sighs, murmurs,
wordless melodies, and novel vocal
e ects.” [
ose who have heard it might
well sco at such a reductive summariza-
tion. –Ed.
]
Roomful of Teeth has performed the
Partita more than
times since
,
including at Ravinia in early
for its
debut at the festival. While Shaw has let
other groups perform it in a few isolated
situations, she has not published the
work or released it for general distribu-
tion. “A lot of groups ask for it,” she says,
“but it’s pretty much a piece for Roomful
of Teeth as our kind of band. In a few
years, maybe I’ll let it go.”
A er receiving the Pulitzer honor,
PATRICK GIPSON/RAVINIA
RAVINIA MAGAZINE | AUGUST 20 – SE3TEM%ER 2, 2018
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