Copy and paste notes for programs.
The Rivers of Bowery
an overture for winds, brass, and percussion
The Rivers of Bowery is an overture with a triumphant vision of the City as complex machine, capable of incubating the lowest in human nature as well as harnessing the best of Man's intentions. The title comes directly from Allen Ginsberg's glorious chronicle of Beat counterculture, Howl. Written in 1956, in a tenement about 2 blocks from where I live on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, Howl celebrates the Beat counterculture by breathlessly rejoicing in the underdog grit of Ginsberg's beloved bohemia. The image is extracted from the line:
...who ate the lamb stew of the imagination or digested the crab at the muddy bottom of the rivers of Bowery.
Ginsberg's river is a rush of people, and not the usual sunny city dwellers of an E.B. White essay or an O'Henry story, but his specific anti-community of the lost, the drugged, and the outcast. Ginsberg presents his city as possessing a triumphant spirit, neighbors piled on top of each other, never letting each other down despite being torn apart by society and by themselves.
Symphony No. 1, My Hands Are a City (2008-9) is a 3-mvt expansion of The Rivers of Bowery.
—JN
1861, a hymn fantasia for concert band -
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3 O’Clock Mix, for school ensemble -
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Across the groaning continent, from Symphony No. 1, My Hands Are a City -
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As the scent of spring rain..., for wind ensemble -
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Avenue X, for wind band -
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Blow It Up, Start Again, for orchestra -
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Blow It Up, Start Again, for wind ensemble -
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Chunk, a funk for winds and percussion -
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Climbing Parnassus, for wind ensemble -
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Concertino, for flute solo, chamber winds, and piano -
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De Profundis, for massed winds -
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Deep Sky Blue, for viola and piano -
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Dohyci, miniature for violin and bass clarinet -
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Lullaby for Munch in Hell, for saxophone quartet -
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Metropolitan, for orchestra -
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Milori Blue, for euphonium and piano -
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Moon by Night, for band and optional chorus -
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Moon by Night, Anthem for SATB chorus -
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My Hands Are a City, from Symphony No. 1, My Hands Are a City -
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Nocturnes, for piano solo -
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Ohanashi, for sinfonia -
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OK Feel Good, for chamber group -
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OK Feel Good, for wind orchestra -
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Practicing Joy, for percussion solo -
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Prayers of Steel, for brass quintet -
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Prelude on "Schmücke Dich", for organ solo -
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Single, for wind band -
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Sowing Useful Truths, for wind ensemble -
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Stereo Action, for percussion ensemble -
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Symphony No. 1, My Hands Are a City, for wind ensemble -
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The Americans, from Symphony No. 1, My Hands Are a City -
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The Vinyl Six, for mixed chamber ensemble -
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These Inflected Tentacles, for marimba, piano, violin, and cello -
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Tree, for string orchestra -
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Uncle Sid, fantasy on a folk tune -
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Verses from Solomon, for soprano and organ -
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Vivid Geography, for women's chorus and chamber orchestra -
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Wapwallopen, string quartet no. 1 -
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