For string quartet and singer, 7′
“Rosario” started off life as a maritime-themed poem written by Cicely Fox Smith in 1920, which was later set to music by Stockton-based folk singer Joy Rennie. It has since been recorded by many traditional folk and maritime singers. When I first heard the tune (as recorded by the Young’uns), I was immediately struck by the sense of grandeur that you don’t often find in folk tunes. As a musician who works in both the classical and traditional folk idioms, I’m often asked why I don’t blend the two more, à la Bartok or Grainger. For me, the two different kinds of music have very different artistic goals, and serve very different purposes in my life. I find music that attempts to blend the two sort of like making an apple pie using oranges- because the two are so fundamentally different, you’re creating something that fullls the purpose of neither. That kind of music, in my opinion, is at best ineffective and at worst nationalistic.
That being said, when I first heard “Rosario,” I immediately thought- here is one of the rare tunes that can function as both a folk melody and a classical melody. I certainly don’t try to turn the string quartet into a bluegrass band, and the performers shouldn’t either, but I instead create a contemporary-classical sound world in which I can insert veins of rollicking folk sound while still keeping its identity as a concert piece.
Matthew DeChant 