Symphony for the Great Return (2020)
Commissioned by Elliot Moore and the Longmont Symphony Orchestra
Instrumentation: 3222, 4331, timp+3, celesta, strings
Duration: 26 minutes
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In 3 Movements:
Dark Spring Horizon (14:10)
Windows (20:16)
The Great Return (29:28)
I began composing Symphony for the Great Return in late March 2020, shortly after much of America had shut down due to Covid-19. My goal was to write a work that would celebrate the eventual end of the pandemic. I thought this would happen by the fall––little did I know how long the crisis would go on for.
The first movement, Dark Spring Horizon, was written retrospectively on the events of early 2020. As reports about the virus came out of China leading up to spring, I had an increasingly foreboding sense that life, as we knew it, was about to end. In the first movement, the music conjures a relentless growing fear suggested by an ostinato with dissonant dynamic swells from the low strings, bassoons, and clarinets. These repetitive gestures share the atmosphere with melancholic lyrical melodies, all in tandem with the frenetic pulse and energy of life carrying on as normal.
The slow movement, Windows, is a reflection on life during the pandemic and a musical offering for those who made serious sacrifices and took great risks, especially those who lost loved ones or their own lives. Throughout the pandemic, the days of many were marked by isolation or danger. Many of us were forced to see the world through windows, either of our homes or computer screens. From the beginning of the movement, solo strings call to each other as if separated by great distances. Travel and leisure activities decreased dramatically. This slowdown of life is reflected in the music by traditional musical techniques from the past, such as the baroque siciliana dance rhythm as well as the classical sonata form that begins and ends in an F minor key that is unable to move forward or escape.
I started work on the finale, The Great Return, in anticipation of the pandemic’s end. The movement begins with a homage to George Walker’s Lyric for Strings, which was programmed before this symphony at its premiere. The opening theme is a fiery, bombastic variation on the climax of the Lyric. The movement gradually looks forward to better times, featuring moments of tenderness from the solo trombone and oboes, energetic brass fanfares, and a powerful horn feature. The symphony coda begins with a gentle flute melody in triple meter that is passed around the orchestra before resounding in triumphant orchestral polyphony. I wrote the coda with the hope for a return to times with family and friends, many of whom I had not seen for a very long time. Fortunately, these events have now come to pass, but I believe the idea of the great return remains constant––there are always things in life we hope will come again, whether people, seasons, or the first concert of a new year. May we all have many great returns to come!
–John Hennecken, October 2022.