Fantasia en la plaza

World Premiere: New York Philharmonic (with Juillliard Pre-College), David Geffen Hall, Young People’s Concert of April 2024. Daniel Bartholomew-Preisner, conductor.

Recent performances: Juilliard Pre-College Orchestra, Adam Glaser, conductor. Peter Jay Sharp Theater, May 2024.

Duration: 9 min.

Instrumentation: 1.2.2.3.2.1, 4.3.3.1, 4 perc., Harp, Strings.

There’s a private video of the Lincoln Center premiere, including my 3 min. introduction explaining the piece to the young audience. It can be provided UPON REQUEST.

There’s also a studio recording on video, available at the JUILLIARD-LIVE website.

SAMPLE SCORE (click for PDF)

PROGRAM NOTE

This work was commissioned by the Composing Inclusion, a program created by the American Composers Forum, the Juilliard School and the New York Philharmonic thanks to a generous donation from the Sphinx Foundation. I’ve had the pleasure of working with several orchestras made up of young people, so when this opportunity came to me I decided to write a piece that would focus on the point of view of the young musician, those who are just starting their journey into a life devoted to music. At this age, you feel your whole life is ahead of you and everything seems possible – the blissful innocence of youth enables a sense of joy as you discover the beauty of dedicating yourself to music. Everything is new and exciting and the sky's the limit.

As we age we tend to lose some of this energy, so I wanted to channel it by transporting my composer’s mind towards that period of my life in which I was studying music in New York City, frequently attending concerts at Lincoln Center. I remember the sense of excitement as I approached the plaza, eagerly anticipating a night of great music. I would always leave with newfound inspiration and joie-de-vivre.

The program of the piece depicts an imaginary visit to most of the main buildings at Lincoln Center, which make up the 5 sections:

  1. The Revlon Fountain: the first thing we see when we arrive, this beautiful fountain suggests music of wondrous exuberance.

  2. The NYC Ballet: we go into the David Koch Theater, the elegance of ballet music is represented in a colorful waltz.

  3. The Metropolitan Opera House: a rapid segue leads us to the next building, where I include melodramatic lyricism translated from the typical European opera into a language influenced by my Latin American upbringing.

  4. The Juilliard School - constant practice is imperative for the young musician who wants to excel, so I represent this discipline by a section made up mostly of scales!

  5. The New York Philharmonic - The textures of the conservatory lead us directly to the grand finale at the renovated David Geffen Hall. This work is to be premiered at this very hall, so this section serves as a metaphysical culmination of the young musicians joining the veterans of the NY Phil on the same stage.

There are three important motivic or thematic ideas that reappear throughout the score: 1) a five-note ascending scale from which many textures and lines are derived,

2) the “tambito” rhythm in 6/8, which is native to my homeland of Costa Rica,
3) a lyrical theme in a lydian mode which comes to full fruition at the main “aria” of the Met Opera section.

Special thanks to the American Composers Forum, the Sphinx Foundation, the Juilliard School, and the people behind the Composing Inclusion Program who made all this come to life.