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        Commissioned by the Detroit Symphony Orchestra in honor of Elaine Lebenbom

        • 2+pic.2+ca.3.2+cbn/4.4.3.1/timp.3perc/hp.pf(cel)/str
        • 12 min
          • 18th May 2025, Lincoln Glen Church, Saratoga, CA, United States of America
          • 18th May 2025, Lincoln Glen Church, San Jose, CA, United States of America
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        Programme Note

        Composer note:
        Something for the Dark was commissioned by the Detroit Symphony Orchestra as a result of my receiving the DSO Elaine Lebenbom Award for Female Composers in 2014.

        Thinking about Detroit led me to think about resilience, and what it means to endure. After a brief hint of passing doubt, Something for the Dark opens with a bold, heroic statement of hope and fortitude in the horns and trombones. I think of this music as the optimism of a very young person. Initially, I envisioned this motif journeying through a bit of challenge and adversity to arrive at an even stronger, bolder version of itself: Growth! Triumph! A happy ending! But that wasn't what happened. Early into its search for glory, the motif finds itself humbled beyond recognition: a delicate, childlike tune in the flute, harp, and celeste arises in its stead. This new version of hope is then put through a series of challenges that roil and churn it like the sea tossing a small boat — testing it, weathering it, even taunting it with memories of its early hubristic naïvetéé. Eventually, the music finds its way to solid ground, and though its countenance has now darkened, its heroism a distant memory, there is serenity and some wisdom — and perhaps, even, the kind of hope that endures.

        The title of the piece comes from a poem by Philip Levine, the Detroit-born-and-raised, former U.S. Poet Laureate who was best known for his poems about Detroit's working class. The last two lines of For Fran struck me as an apt motto for his many clear-eyed reflections on endurance. In preparing the flower beds for winter, Levine's wife becomes a symbol of the promise of renewal: "She packs the flower beds with leaves / Rags, dampened papers, ties with twine / The lemon tree, but winter carves / Its features on the uprooted stem… I turn to her whose future bears / The promise of the appalling air / My living wife, Frances Levine, Mother of Theodore, John, and Mark / Out of whatever we have been / We will make something for the dark."

        — Sarah Kirkland Snider


        Scores

        Reviews

        The key was Sarah Kirkland Snider’s 2014 Something for the Dark, a mysterious and moody ten-minute opener that combined some modern, modal minimalism relatable to Adams with cinematic gestures and harmonies that threw back to Sibelius. The piece started with warmth, but there was mystery too. Snider quickly established her long game, harmonically spinning out passages, forcing a sense of longing before any phrase resolves. As the piece went on, it grew darker, the handsome surfaces becoming more crinkled and troubled, building up tension that erupted at its climax in sonorous cracks of timpani and snare drum.

        True to its harmonic style, it did not so much resolve as dissolve at the end, but the sense of a turning point had been made. Robertson was in assured control, and the orchestra played magnificently, the reverberant acoustics of the Blossom pavilion contributing to the sense of atmosphere. Not only was Snider, who was in attendance, received warmly by the audience, she was given a second ovation by the portion of the crowd that spotted her heading back to her seat afterwards, an auspicious welcome to a composer making her Cleveland Orchestra debut.

        Mark S Jordan, Seen and Heard International
        9th August 2023
        The concert began with a modern selection in Sarah Kirkland Snider’s colorful Something for the Dark, a sort of concerto for orchestra. Each section enjoyed its moment to shine as the piece cycled through a series of themes and rhythmic variations. It begins with an ethereal high note played by a single violin, and expands into a Mahlerian world of sound and textures.
        Colin Roshak, ClevelandClassical.com
        25th November 2019
        [A] startling, clear-sighted piece…captivating and cohesive…Bold at first, the work built fragile, shifting waves with the intricacy, strength and delicacy of a spider's web. Flourishes emerged from inner voices, creating shimmering cascades of transmuted energy. A single tone of golden silk from concertmaster Sunho Kim brought this energy to a reflective grounding point, McAdams shaping these final moments with the gentle, yet sudden, dissolution of dappled shadows.
        Libby Hansen, KC Studio Magazine
        29th March 2019
        In this sophisticated piece, repetition transforms the emotional charge of musical motifs. A turn of phrase may appear pretty at first, then take on shades of nostalgia before registering as a creepy obsession haunting the ear. Ms. Snider skillfully draws a wide arc, with throbbing brass accents and slashing chords driving up tension. The work ends quietly, as if on a question.
        Corinna da Fonseca-Wollheim, The New York Times
        21st November 2018
        Sarah Kirkland Snider’s Something for the Dark, which the Detroit Symphony Orchestra commissioned and premiered on April 14, represents the best of what a commission can yield. It is an an imposing achievement marked by Snider’s unique musical language and decisive artistic vision.

        Snider wrote Something for the Dark as recipient of the Detroit Symphony’s Elaine Lebenbom Award for Female Composers…
        Garrett Schumann, ClassicalVoiceAmerica.org/
        21st April 2016