• 3222/4331/timp+4perc/str; [opt. crystal glasses]
  • 8 min

Programme Note




Scores

Reviews

Stookey’s Big Bang opened the program on a celebratory note. The San Francisco-based composer creates a bright-toned, rhythmically compelling sound world with the 10-minute piece, with especially attractive writing for brass and percussion.
Georgia Rowe, Contra Costa Times
22nd November 2004
The orchestra briefly took on a brighter sound for the West Coast premiere of Big Bang, by San Francisco native Nathaniel Stookey. This […] fanfare-like piece is a delightful concoction of whimsical, gentle twists. In about five minutes, through fits and starts of melodic material spun out of simple two and three-note combinations, Stookey winds his way […] to a sonorous conclusion.

The memorable moments include some charming, sputtering solos for trombone, a delectable beat for hand-tapped drums and, finally, an eerily pleasing peroration with antiphonal trumpets and 250 water-filled crystal glasses rubbed by the audience up in the balcony. […] I wasn’t quite sure how Stookey got us from point A to point B, but in the fun of it all, I hardly cared.
Jeff Rosenfeld, San Francisco Classical Voice
19th November 2004
Stookey, the Symphony’s 30-year-old composer-in-residence, offered Big Bang, a refreshing and delightful exploration of the textures and timbres of the orchestra that came to a haunting ending. Audience members in the balconies were asked to rub crystal glasses to create a ringing sound that lingered after the orchestra had stopped playing. Perhaps this represented the background radiation scientists talk about from the original Big bang, or simply the afterglow of music as it dissolves into the mind. The sound – an utterly new timbre in a new hall – lingered in my ear long after the blah virtuosity of the Liszt Piano Concerto and the worn chipperness of Bernstein’s ‘On the Town’ had faded. I felt the universe had been enlarged just a little bit. […]

The sound of Stookey’s crystal glasses – and the sense of anticipation and involvement that came along with it – reminded me of what classical music can be about. I like to think it is the sound of the future.
David Perkins, The Spectator, Raleigh NC
22nd March 2001
[Big Bang] exploded into the new hall with a force that recalls the world’s birth from Chaos. [The] ‘glass harmonica’ [150 tuned crystal glasses that sustain the final chord] added an eerily-charged conclusion to Stookey’s rhythmic musical vision.

The sound, remarkably, hung in the air like a phantom.
Carl J. Halperin, The Herald-Sun, Durham NC
25th February 2001