David Lang: Thorn Molly Barth

• David Lang (b. 1957):
• 1Lang: Thorn03:59
• 2Lang: Lend/Lease04:05
• 3Lang: Short Fall04:08
• 4Lang: Involuntary03:14
• 5Lang: Vent08:01
• 6Lang: Burn Notice06:23
• 7Lang: Frag07:02
• Total Runtime36:52

Info for David Lang: Thorn

thorn is flutist and eighth blackbird founding member Molly Barth's collection of short works by David Lang, and has been described as "...a varied yet consistent overview of Lang’s chamber music activities, a vital part of his output that deserves continued attention even as he moves into larger forms and more expansive concepts. The performances, by Barth and a small host of excellent associates (including fellow former blackbird Matt Albert on violin), strike just the right balance between nervous tension and technical security." (Steve Smith, The Log Journal)

About the title piece, David Lang writes: "My first idea for thorn was to embed a single spike somewhere in the middle of a long, slow, quiet melody. I thought that the listener would then spend the first part of the piece in fear and the second part in shock, and this would change the ways that the tune would be perceived. The problem was that the spike turned out to be the most interesting part of the piece, and, ultimately, I couldn’t resist the temptation to add many, many more of them."

Molly Barth, flute, piccolo
Zachariah Galatis, piccolo
Sarah Viens, trumpet
Joshua Silva, trumpet
Melissa Peña, oboe
Matt Albert, violin
Jeffrey Zeigler, cello
David Riley, piano
Stuart Gerber, woodblocks, percussion

Molly Alicia Barth
Described as "ferociously talented" (The Oregonian), Grammy-Award winning flutist Molly Alicia Barth specializes in the music of today. In demand as a soloist, Molly has recently performed in Australia, Korea, and Mexico and has played solo recitals and led clinics at esteemed institutions including the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music, Oberlin Conservatory, Cincinnati Conservatory, San Francisco Conservatory and Northwestern University Bienen School of Music.

Contemporary chamber music is Molly’s primary musical interest, and she is currently involved with three ensembles. Formed by Molly Barth and guitarist Dieter Hennings, Duo Damiana is focused on broadening the cutting-edge body of repertoire for flute and guitar. As co-founder of the Beta Collide New Music Project, Molly has collaborated with individuals from a broad spectrum of disciplines such as dance, art, sound sculpture and theoretical physics. With Beta Collide, she has recorded two CDs and one DVD with Innova Records. Molly is the Associate Professor of Flute at the University of Oregon, where she is a member of the Oregon Wind Quintet. The Oregon Wind Quintet, which regularly tours throughout the Pacific Northwest, performs a large body of contemporary music along with standard wind quintet repertoire.

As a founding member of the new music sextet eighth blackbird from 1996-2006, Molly won the 2007 “Best Chamber Music Performance” Grammy Award, recorded four CDs with Cedille Records, and was granted the 2000 Naumburg Chamber Music Award and first prize at the 1998 Concert Artists Guild International Competition.

Before assuming her teaching position at the University of Oregon, Molly taught at Willamette University and held residencies at the University of Chicago and at the University of Richmond. She is a graduate of the Oberlin College- Conservatory of Music, Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, and Northwestern University School of Music. Molly’s principal teachers include Michel Debost, Kathleen Chastain, Randolph Bowman, Bradley Garner, and Walfrid Kujala. In addition to frequent solo and master class appearances worldwide, Molly’s adjudication experience includes work with the National Endowment for the Arts, Australian Flute Festival, National Flute Association (USA), and the Alpert Award in the Arts (Los Angeles). She has commissioned scores of solo and chamber works, and has appeared on television and radio shows nationwide. Molly plays a Burkart flute and piccolo, and a 1953 Haynes alto flute.

David Lang
Passionate, prolific and complicated, composer David Lang embodies the restless spirit of invention. At the same time, he is also deeply versed in the classical tradition, and committed to music that resists categorization, all while constantly seeking out and creating new forms. In the words of The New Yorker, "With his winning of the Pulitzer Prize for the little match girl passion (one of the most original and moving scores of recent years), Lang, once a postminimalist enfant terrible, has solidified his standing as an American master."

Lang is Musical America's 2013 Composer of the Year and recipient of Carnegie Hall's Debs Composer's Chair for 2013-2014 — testament to his standing as one of America's most performed composers. Many of his works resemble each other only in the fierce intelligence and clarity of vision that inform their structures. His catalogue is extensive, ranging from the hauntingly soulful death speaks (sung by Shara Worden and featuring The National's Bryce Dessner, pianist Nico Muhly and violinist Owen Pallett) to the playful, wistful love fail (with Anonymous 4). Lang's opera, orchestra, chamber and solo works are by turns ominous, ethereal, urgent, hypnotic, unsettling and emotionally direct. Much of his work seeks to expand the definition of virtuosity in music — even his deceptively simple pieces can be fiendishly difficult to play, and require incredible concentration by musicians and audiences alike.

“I came out of the modernist era,” Lang told eMusic's Wondering Sound in 2014, “when people were making statements like 'I write what needs to be written, not what people want to hear,' and 'Music is powerless to express anything.' I don’t believe that. For me, the compositional act is not sitting in my studio thinking about being a genius; it’s about communicating something to musicians that they can communicate to audiences.”

Booklet for David Lang: Thorn