Soldier Songs is an evening-length work for voice, amplified ensemble, film and electronics by composer David T. Little. It was originally premiered, and the initial production designed, by the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble. Soldier Songs is currently seeking venues for the 2007-2008 season. Please contact us if you are interested.
Concert Review: 'Soldier Songs' packs heartrending wallop
By Eric Haines
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Monday, July 31, 2006
Composer David Little is not yet 30 and is still working on his Ph.D., yet his list of classical works is as long as your arm. If his latest, "Soldier Songs," premiered on Friday by Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble at City Theatre on the South Side, is any indication, quality equals quantity in a big way.
Commissioned by PNME and composed over a span of 18 months, the work explores the dichotomous relationship of war and our society. "We live in a culture where violence thrives," Little writes, "where our children play war games and pretend to kill one another for fun." The 50-minute cycle is a semitheatrical piece that follows the experience of war from the consequence-less age of a child through the age of a warrior, where the consequences are real and severe, on to the reflective stage of a veteran.
Little wrote the texts based on interviews with some half-dozen military personnel. To add impact, although the music was powerful enough, slides and videos were projected onto a large upstage screen.
Little's compositional language is eclectic and diverse, encompassing 19th-century Romanticism and polytonality, percussive counterpoint and musical theatre lyricism, semi-tone tuning and diatonic harmonies. The only selection on the program, "Soldier Songs" is a challenging work in both musical material and subject matter. "In all honesty I can say that this is not a piece that many professional ensembles would have the courage to tackle," says Little. Led by artistic director Kevin Noe, the PNME handled it masterfully.
"Part One: Child," begins with "Real American Hero" in which a child gleefully sings of "killing all the bad guys with the funny names" while playing with action figures. "Boom! Bang! Dead!" depicts a teenager playing a violent video game, with the actual, rapid-paced game on the projection screen. The frenetic tempo is interrupted by a Sondheim-like passage in which the teen muses about not really being harmed if he loses. The work continues with such titles as "Counting the Days," "Every Town Has a Wall" and "Old Friends with Large Weapons."
"Soldier Songs" is not a loosely connected cycle, but a dramatic, theatrical solo cantata that builds to a heartrending climax with the third and fourth songs of "Part Two: Warrior." In "Hollywood Ending," a soldier bewails his helplessness in the aftermath of a car bombing. It is one of the more troubling scenes of the show, accompanied by photos from the actual event: graphically gruesome shots of the death and destruction.
"Hollywood Ending" segues into "Steel Rain," a military term for incoming ordnance. The text is a spoken, verbatim monologue from the soldier who described the car bombing. The musicians crawl off the smoke-filled stage, as though escaping a fearsome barrage. Jagged, dissonant recorded music builds to a thunderous level and a protracted, brilliantly conceived light show left no doubt as to dramatic content.
With each of the 11 songs as gripping as the last, the cycle was a signature vehicle for bass-baritone Timothy Jones. He adroitly adapted his masterful technique and flawless diction to the core of each tune. He conveyed the brashness of "Boom! Bang! Dead!," the roboticism of "Still Life with Tank and iPod" and the angst of "Two Marines," which began as a painful lament and morphed into a glowing paean to peace activism.
Concert Review: Scenes from the Arts-burgh
by Mark Kanny
Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
Tuesday, August 1, 2006
Composer David T. Little avoids many of the problems associated with political art in his one-hour "Soldier Songs" that was premiered by the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble at the final concerts of its season Friday and Saturday at City Theatre.
By drawing upon comments by military personnel from World War II, Vietnam, the Cold War and before and after 9/11, Little focuses on the experience of war per se -- not any particular conflict or the domestic political divisiveness of some wars. The 27-year-old composer's selection and creation of his texts provides a variety of expressions -- poignant, ironic and direct.
Little is masterful in marshaling the extra-musical aspects of his work, including the sound-design accompanying movies of war scenes and then soldiers' recorded voices, which preceded all the music.
The performance of bass-baritone Timothy Jones was a tour-de-force, equally masterful as a 6-year-old enjoying war toys in an ominous musical context, a teenager taking manic delight in computer war games, active soldiers dealing with the awesome realities of war, and elders' offering weary wisdom.
Hey, great idea! All best wishes for this wonderful work to have a long and fruitful life: it's an awesome piece and I am privleged to have been there to help bring it into the world. Kudos!
