SANTA CRUZ — Every summer, orchestral players and music lovers gather at the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music for two weeks’ worth of new and recent offerings played at the highest level.
. . . “Water Sings Fire,” a marvelously dark and affecting work by the American composer Andrea Reinkemeyer.
SANTA CRUZ, CA—Resolute not to let Covid win for the third year in a row, the plucky Cabrillo Festival cobbled together a concert program with half an orchestra to prevent yet another cancellation.
. . . forceful enough to wake the dead and break any jinxes as well.
"I was struck most with Water Sings Fire – a 12-minute piece composed by Portland native Andrea Reinkemeyer, who teaches composition and theory at Linfield College. … But this is not the Disney version of The Little Mermaid. The comic book evolution of the story and of Ulla’s character is far darker … Indeed, the music conjures images of pitch-black alleys and desolate landscapes. I could envision Ulla walking this ground, alone at night, and absorbing the motivations of everyone, including herself, that has led to this destruction."
A world-class composer, Reinkemeyer’s most recent commissioned piece, Water Sings Fire, was commissioned for the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra (LPO) by the League of American Orchestras’ 2017 Women Composers Readings and Commissions program, administered by American Composers Orchestra, and supported by the Virginia B. Toulmin Foundation.
“ One of the things that defines Reinkemeyer's music is that it isn't daunted by nature... finding discordant grace where other composers would flinch.” “ As I listened, I discovered a composer who looks to the horizon, but also gazes within, translating private pains and passions into exquisite works.”
"Andrea Reinkemeyer, who flew in from Thailand just for this premiere, wrote an excellent duo “Wrought Iron” for flute and percussion. Albert Brouwer played the stuffings out of the terrific flute part, which was clever, funky, jazzy and virtuosic."