Quartet for a New Tomorrow

by James Stephenson. @/quartet-for-a-new-tomorrow/ 0:00 Composer introduction 5:12 Prayer 9:35 Action 16:09 Promise 21:31 Hope Stephen Williamson, clarinet; Yuan-Qing Yu, violin; Nathan Olsen, cello; Winston Choi, piano. Commissioned by Ensemble Chamarré, with additional co-commissioned support from ROCO, Civitas Ensemble, Kennesaw State University, and anonymous donors Program Notes: Chamber music is dear to my heart. Music that is allowed to explore universal feelings with which we can all identify is also dear to my heart. So when I was approached by Ensemble Chamarré to compose a piece with the same instrumentation as Olivier Messiaen's famous "Quatuor pour la fin du temps" (Quartet for the End of Time), I was at once immediately daunted, but nonetheless inspired. Messiaen's work is one of the most precious works in all of chamber music, given the situation under which it was composed and the resulting music that emerged. In writing my piece, endeavored not to try to musically comment on his work. To me, it is too sacred, and not to be touched. But rather, I would take the overall sentiment, and devise instead perhaps the opposite: my own musical scheme to espouse what it means to have hope, and how to possibly achieve that thing which is hoped for. My "Quartet" is therefore set out in four movements: Prayer, Action, Promise, and finally, Hope. The Prayer is as one might expect: a contemplative, thoughtful chorale (in E minor) over which a simple melody is played. This theme develops, grows, intensifies (not all prayers are one-dimensional), and finally resolves in one last statement, though this time ending in E Major: our first glimmer of hope that our prayer might be answered. The second movement, Action, borrows from a motif from "Prayer" (because a prayer can't be answered without action), and immediately launches the music into active fervor. Rhythmic syncopation and uncertainty finally lands into a jazz-influenced waltz, which for me was a direct injection of taking the music from an older sensibility into something more current. Or, to borrow from the title, music that takes us from the today into the "tomorrow". It finishes with the opening material being reprised, before finally ending solidly in A minor. Promise, the third movement, in a quasi-modal B Major, opens with a non-committal and ethereal piano introduction. Finally, the key is established, and the solo clarinet is featured. Each instrument joins in on the lush, beautiful music, as I wanted a "promise" to be a beautiful thing, as if someone laid their hand on your shoulder, and were to say: "Don't worry, everything will be ok." The last movement, Hope, might surprise listeners. It would be easy to assume that "Hope", or the culmination of this work, would be slow, grandiose, full of big, open, and soul-stirring music. I chose instead to revert to childlike hope, where thoughts have yet to be clouded by the worries and stresses that time inevitably injects. It is simple, jaunty, and 'eyebrows-up' music, meant to answer the solemnity of the opening "Prayer". And at the end, the music does indeed repeat the work's opening chorale, but now in A Major, and therefore answering and "resolving" the opening 'prayer' that was stated in E. I would be highly remiss if I didn't thank Ensemble Chamarré for approaching me with this idea, as well as the co-commissioners who joined in, who all provided me with so much inspiration for composing this work. But most importantly, I want to thank Mr. Messiaen himself, for composing such a masterful work: not one to be imitated, nor a piece one would attempt to equal; but a piece that by embodying what it does, with such humanity, can do nothing but inspire the rest of us to dig deep within to try to create art to the best of our abilities. ~ Jim Stephenson; September 3, 2025