Adagio tenebroso (1994) | Compositions | Elliott Carter, composer

Instrumentation: 3(II,III=picc).2.corA.2(II=Ebcl).bcl.2.dbn-4.3.3.1-timp.perc(4):BD/4bongos/glsp/4tpl.bl/cowbells/vib/2susp.cym/2tom-t/2wdbl/SD/xyl/tam-t/marimba/wood drum/2metal block-pft-strings
Contained In: Symphonia: sum fluxae pretium spei (1993)
Buy Score: Hendon Music (Boosey & Hawkes)
Manuscripts: Paul Sacher Stiftung

Premiere: Sep 13, 1995/ BBC Symphony Orchestra / Andrew Davis/ Royal Albert Hall, London

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Adagio tenebroso clip

As I thought about this score, I remembered the poem of the Jacobean poet, Richard Crashaw, Bulla (Bubble) in which a floating bubble is personified and thinks about earthly things, especially in this passage:

Sum caecae speculum Deae.
Sum fortunae ego tessera;
Quam dat militibus suis;
Sum fortunae ego symbolum,
Cum mortalibus Ebriis
Obsignatque tabellulas.

I am the glass of the blind goddess;
I am the die of fortune which she gives her soldiers;
I am the creed of fortune by which she confirms the tenuous faith of drunken
mortals and seals their documents.

Adagio Tenebroso was commissioned by the British Broadcasting Company to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Promenade Concerts. It is dedicated to the Proms and to Amira and Alexander Goehr.

It was composed during my 85th year mostly at Southbury, Connecticut.

– Elliott Carter

Recordings (3)

Carter: Symphonia / Ives: Robert Browning Overture
Neos (2015)
Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra | Emilio Pomarico, conductor
Elliott Carter: Symphonia: Sum Fluxae Pretium Spei
Deutsche Grammophon 0289 479 1520 1 (2013)
Michael Collins, clarinet | London Sinfonietta, Oliver Knussen, conductor | BBC Symphony Orchestra
Carter: Clarinet Concerto; Symphonia
Deutsche Grammophon 459 660-2 (2000)
Michael Collins, clarinet | London Sinfonietta, Oliver Knussen, conductor | BBC Symphony Orchestra