Canyon Singers Concert
"Mostly Originals"
featuring original music by Sandra Reid

Relentless Tide, an original 3-part choral work written by Sandra Reid, will premier at Canyon Singers' 17th annual spring concert, to be held on Friday, May 9th, 2008, at 7 pm in the Great Room.  Sandy has also composed the accompaniment:  two violin parts, to be performed by Allen Ames and Clarence Shaw; classical guitar by Maryanne Kremer-Ames; and flute, by Anthony Flesch.  Also included in the performance are two selections sung by a Canyon Singers' women’s trio; an original piano composition to be played by Reid; a duet sung by Abby Fritts and Michael Teeple; two delightful selections by Canyon Singers’ madrigal group; separate folk songs by the entire women’s and men’s sections; and several shorter pieces by the entire group.  Piano accompaniment for these will be by Canyon Singer’s own Kathie Jossie.  Reid is the founder and Director of this 17-year old community chorus.  A free reception for concertgoers will follow the program.  For ticket information call Sandra Reid, 282-5928, or Margi Vanderlippe, 284-3598.  A donation of $12 is suggested.  Canyon Singers is sponsored by Sedona Community Center.

Reid’s late husband Larry was, like Sandy, a singer, music teacher, director, and pianist.  A mysterious illness struck him in 1994, leaving him immobile, bed-ridden, and with a breathing tube.  Yet one night Larry had a dream of such urgent meaningfulness that he dictated it to Sandy using eye blinks as she pointed to letters on a chart.  It took them an entire morning.

Sandy put her notes of the dream into a cherished manila envelope in which she kept a poem, “Relentless Tide,” written in 1960 while earning her B.A. in Music Education.  In 1976 she had set the poem to music.  The envelope also contained phrases and random melodies which Sandy wrote or found, all about life ebbing and flowing like the tides.  Larry died in 1998. The Canyon Singers had eagerly awaited her return.  The thought crossed Sandy’s mind that she would like to write music for her husband’s dream, which now seemed a continuum of her “Relentless Tide” composition.

As ideas for the music grew, Sandy’s free time diminished.  She was teaching piano and voice, directing a chorus and a choir, and tending to her elderly mother.  Then, in 2006, Sandy’s sister Mary Dill phoned Sandy and said, “You need time to write.  Let’s move Mom home to Iowa with me.” After the move, Sandy composed for two full mornings weekly.  The music for “Relentless Tide” would be the first movement, but retitled “Innocence.”  The trilogy she now had in mind would assume the “Relentless Tide” name.

Larry’s dream would become the second and third movements.  Larry had dreamt of a giant clock face in the sky, the clock hands at noon.  As the hour hand advanced from noon to one to two, etc., a tone was added at each hour.  The tones, simple at first, became fuller and fuller as the hand descended, until, at six o’clock, it was an overwhelming cacophony.

But then, like a receding tide, the hand moved up the opposite hours.  The tones began to fall off just as they had grown.  When the hand completed its circle, a single note of overwhelming beauty and peace remained.  Yet—most meaningfully to Larry—that sublime tone contained the full, rich essence of all the previous sounds, both their distress and their beauty.  For Larry, perhaps it was a metaphor for his life.

The vocal score for “Relentless Tide” was completed right before Canyon Singers began rehearsing it in January.  Although extremely challenging, the singers loved the piece.  The underlying poetry and philosophy are inspiring.  The harmonies, melodic lines and rhythms are complex and sometimes dissonant.  The group focused itself as never before.  The trilogy begins in youthful innocence, goes through a period of chaotic searching and longing, and finally resolves in a realization of the universality of the human experiences of love and faith.

 

 For further information please contact
 Sedona Creative Life Center  928-282-9300