Chicago Songs — Kurt Erickson

Instrumentation: 2222 / 221 / perc (3) / harp / piano-celesta / sop solo / strings
Duration: 20 minutes
Author: Carl Sandburg
Commissioner: Sacramento Philharmonic
Premiere: Premiered by Sacramento Philharmonic with conductor Michael Morgan and soprano Marnie Breckenridge. Sacramento, CA. Texts by Carl Sandburg from his collection Chicago Poems.

“Conductor Michael Morgan and the orchestra (Sacramento Philharmonic) made its biggest mark with the work of American composers Erickson and Bernstein. The highlight was the world premiere of Erickson’s five-movement “Chicago Songs,” sung by the expressive soprano Marnie Breckenridge, for whom the pieces were written. Each intimate piece offered haunting and poetic musical lines for soprano that played against tightly focused and descriptive writing for strings and winds.”

— Edward Ortiz, Sacramento Bee

Composer Kurt Erickson · Chicago Songs - for Voice & Piano

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SACRAMENTO BEE // 'Chicago Songs' intended as poetry to ear

“This composer, a 38-year-old Fresno native, is the same age poet Carl Sandburg was when he wrote and published the “Chicago Poems,” which Erickson used as the inspiration for his “Chicago Songs.” The commissioned work will get its world premiere when the Sacramento Philharmonic performs a program of music from the Americas on Nov. 1”