Sarasota Music Festival - American Soundscapes

American Soundscapes

This one-night-only musical event sums up the spirit of the 2024 Festival—unbound, uninhibited, and genuinely transformative. Hailstork’s beautifully evocative Sonata da Chiesa—“church sonata” in the Baroque era—reflects his personal fascination with cathedrals. Written for Benny Goodman, Copland’s dynamic Clarinet Concerto is the only conductor-led piece on the program. Tessa Lark, Mike Block, and Jeffrey Kahane improvise on beloved American songs, while Lark and Block duet with traditional fiddle tunes. The perfumed world of 18th-century France collides with 21st-century jazz in Block’s arrangement of Dieupart’s Sarabande, then Block leads Festival fellows in an exhilarating, spur-of-the-moment jam. Lark puts her distinctive stamp on bluegrass legend Bill Monroe’s “Blue Moon of Kentucky,” and the experience culminates with Iniche Cosebe, Block’s quasi-improvised work inspired by “thank you very much” in the language of the Mandinka people.

Program

HAILSTORK Sonata da Chiesa
COPLAND    Clarinet Concerto
Improvisations on Beloved American Songs
Traditional Fiddle Tunes
DIEUPART (arr. Mike Block)  Sarabande
Arr. Mike Block with SMF fellows  Global Music Collaboration
MONROE (arr. Teddy Abrams)  Blue Moon of Kentucky
MIKE BLOCK  Iniche Cosebe

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