Stratagems

Stratagems consists of six movements, each based on a phrase drawn from a deck of cards created by Brian Eno and Peter Schmidt in 1975. Each movement is accompanied by a monologue by Meghan Deans based on the same phrase. The music and monologues may be performed as a pair or independently, and the six sets may be performed as a full work or on their own.

Read the monologues.

Stratagems was premiered in an unfinished form by The Current in Chicago, August 2004.

One movement, "Convert a melodic element into a rhythmic element," was selected as a winner of the San Francisco Choral Artists' New Voices Project (Magen Solomon, director). It was premiered by the SCFA in June 2005.

Program notes by Meghan Deans:

"Stratagems was first a series of monologues based on Oblique Strategies, a deck of cards created by Brian Eno and Peter Schmidt in 1975. Advertised as "Over one hundred worthwhile dilemmas," each card in the deck has a shiny black backing and a short phrase on the front intended to help all comers approach problems from alternative directions. "Accept advice," advises one; another, "Emphasize the flaws,"; and one, simply "Courage!" Oblique Strategies have been republished several times over, each deck slightly different than the one before. A list of all the Strategies impresses a sort of calmness on the reader, a reminder that problems can be solved as simply as turning over a tape or concentrating on a static element.

The monologues were written over the summer of 2004 as individual meditations on six strategies. They are largely colored by a desire to be both politically vigilant and personally sane, a desire that sometimes seems particularly unreasonable and almost untenable. Pre-election, post-election, pre/post-during wartime, a deck of cards seems just like a deck of cards until you turn over the one that, unbelievably, sounds like the answer you need at that moment. In the spirit of problem-solving, I made attempts to turn my own writing on its side, keeping away from any conventions I had built in the past and hoping only that the final product was warm. "

Instrumentation:
piano
3 clarinets in B-flat
3 trumpets in C
bass clarinet
tenor trombone

hear a sample ("It Is Quite Possible, After All"): [mp3 / right click + save as]
(( performed by The Current ))