As the 700th program of the Jacobs School of Music 2024-2025 season, NOTUS’ spring concert “Reflections and Meditations” had a unique edge that set it apart from the previous 699 concerts – almost half of the nine total pieces performed were making their world premiere.
When the group last performed at the “Voices and Video Games” concert in January, they performed new arrangements, but the basis for the pieces was previously composed and published by the composer who had been hired to score the specific video game it was associated with.
“Metropolis” by Matthew Lyon Hazzard was the first piece of the night and it was adapted into a libretto from Jonathan Talberg’s “Metropolis: New York.” It was performed almost immediately after the choir entered the stage. The piece started abruptly with the choir talking amongst themselves in hushed tones before gradually going into the song at NOTUS director Dominick DiOrio’s conducting. Visiting academic specialist Melivia Raharjo accompanied them on the piano throughout and the song ended exactly as it had started with the choir gradually breaking off into conversations again.
“The first and last works by Matthew Lyon Hazzard and myself both feature the piano as a sonic book-end,” NOTUS director Dominick DiOrio said in a booklet that offered commentary that was offered to audience members alongside the concert’s program. “With Melivia Raharjo at the keys, we first hear Matt and Jon's exploration of the vitality of New York City, with all of its rumbles, ramblings, and possibilities,”
DiOrio has been the director of NOTUS since 2012, when he was first hired by Jacobs. As it was NOTUS’ final concert of the year, DiOrio found himself reflecting on his time with NOTUS and its programs thus far.
“The ones that I remember most vividly are those that feature a panoply of composers, texts, styles, and sounds, all connected back to a singular theme,” DiOrio said. “When such varied works are juxtaposed under a common umbrella, we can begin to recognize resonances within and between artworks which may not have been obvious otherwise.”
In his 12 years with NOTUS, DiOrio’s impact on the program is already evident. He first renamed the choir from its previous name “Contemporary Vocal Ensemble,” naming it after the Greek god of the southern wind. Additionally, he created a new tradition within Jacobs – the annual NOTUS Student Composition Contest.
NOTUS performed both the winning and runner-up compositions at “Reflections and Meditations” as their world premieres. IU junior Courage Barda and sophomore Eli Hocking composed “La mandoline,” the runner-up composition.
Barda and Hocking got their inspiration from a writing by Guillaume Apollinaire, a French writer. He wrote from his combat experiences, with “La mandoline” being inspired by soldiers carrying the lightweight mandolin to still play music during the war's violence.
IU graduate student Jieun Ok composed the winning piece “Nil-ri-ri-ya.” Her basis for the piece was found in traditional Korean folk music. She utilized the saxophone in addition to voice, as its timber can best imitate the piri, traditional Korean wind instrument.
“Although the lyrics contain sorrowful themes such as yearning for an absent lover and lamenting old age, the lively refrain and cheerful melody of the original song contrast with the sadness of the text,” Ok said.
After the performance of “Nil-ri-ri-ya,” NOTUS performed Jacobs professor David Dzubay’s “Three Meditations” for its world premiere. Dzubay said he was inspired by Hindu mantras and split the piece into three parts based on specific mantras: “AUM,” “Namah Shivaya” and “Soham.”
Dzubay described each movement as musically distinct, with each one acting as a device for evolving the piece thematically. “AUM” was just scales with the sole lyric being the guttural chant. “Namah Shivaya” was a vocal tapestry with the lower voices starting before building to the low choir. “Soham” revolved around breathing and asking questions within the mind.
While NOTUS’ next piece originally debuted in 2012, “Night Flight,” was performed differently than it was when it originally premiered. “Night Flight” has a cellist accompany the choir, and NOTUS was accompanied by IU graduate student Nick Hilliard. To better emphasize the cello, Hilliard used the celladore, an invention made by associate professor D. James “Jamie” Tagg. The celladore is the world’s first acoustically-optimized cello podium, and its invention has made Tagg the first Jacobs faculty to receive a patent for an invention.
“You will hear that it resonates in sympathy with the instrument so that the clarity of the player's intention is ever more obvious to us as listeners, both in the audience and even in the choir,” DiOrio said. “When we tried it out yesterday for the first time, it was amazing how much detail you could hear even when singing fortissimo.”
NOTUS then performed “Glimpse Elation” which was composed in 2021 by Derrick Skye. The composition expanded upon an original text written by Skye about the complex feeling of elation. “Alleluia,” an excerpt from “Exaltations” by Reena Esmail, was performed next. During the song, master’s student Pelagia Pamel and doctoral student Benjamin Wegner sang solos in between associate professor Brittany Lasch playing her trombone and the rest of the choir singing.
The last world premiere of the night was “A Clear Midnight” written by Jacobs alumnus Kahan Taraporevala. His inspiration was from “A Clear Midnight” by Walt Whitman.
“It's a wonderful poem and I used some textural elements in the voice and the cello to represent the reflective nature of this poem,” Taraporevala said.
NOTUS concluded the concert with DiOrio’s own work “My Harbor, My Home.” DiOrio composed the piece in 2023 for the Macalester Concert Choir, with it being the third piece he has written for them.
“This is music for a time of rebirth, for a new chapter of hope,” DiOrio said.
“Reflections and Meditations” was NOTUS’ final solo concert of the season, but they are expected to perform during the upcoming “Spring Ballet” on March 28-29. Tickets for the ballet can be purchased on the Jacobs website.
