CURRENT PROJECTS
—Fanfare for Symphony under the Sky. Commissioned by the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra for 2013.
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Resident Composer of the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra |
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Supported in part by the Canada Council for the Arts |
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| William Eddins, Jens Lindemann, Robert Rival, John Estacio & Allan Gilliland with the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra at Carnegie Hall, May 8, 2012. Photo © Steve J. Sherman. |
"...gentle textures and flowing themes occasionally yield surprising harmonic turns and briskly changing meters." —Allan Kozinn, New York Times, on Lullaby, which received its US premiere at this concert. |
"...a work of quiet rapture and refined sensibility...elegant concision..." —Jack Sullivan, American Record Guide |
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| UPCOMING EVENTS |
| Date |
Location |
Work |
Details |
| 2013 |
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| May 24 |
Edmonton, AB |
Traces of a Silent Landscape |
Vaughan String Quartet. Also Shostakovich 8 & Mozart K.465. Muttart Hall, 19:30. |
| May 25 |
Toronto, ON |
Fantasy on a Theme of Schubert |
Scarborough Philharmonic Orchestra chamber series. David Lakirovich, violin; Marc Widner, piano. St. Paul's L'Amoreaux Anglican Church. |
| Sep 2 |
Edmonton, AB |
Whirlwind |
Edmonton Symphony Orchestra. Bob Bernhardt, cond. Symphony Under the Sky. Hawrelak Park. |
| Oct 26 |
Edmonton, AB |
Achilles & Scamander |
Edmonton Symphony Orchestra. Lucas Waldin, cond. Symphony for Kids: Music of the Night Sky. |
| 2014 |
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| Mar 2 |
Edmonton, AB |
Lullaby |
Edmonton Symphony Orchestra. William Eddins, cond. Winspear Centre. |
May 2
& May 3 |
Edmonton, AB |
[13/14 commission #1] |
For choir & orchestra (without strings). Edmonton Symphony Orchestra & Richard Eaton Singers. William Eddins, cond. Winspear Centre. |
| May 11 |
Edmonton, AB |
[13/14 commission #2] |
Variations on a popular Canadian song. Edmonton Symphony Orchestra. William Eddins, cond. Winspear Centre. |
| May 12 |
Ottawa, ON |
Whirlwind |
Ottawa Symphony Orchestra. David Currie, cond. National Arts Centre. |
| Spring Brings Snowstorm to Edmonton |
MAR 2013—Edmonton has marked the arrival of spring with a crippling snowstorm. At least in the aftermath it's sunny. Here's an update on my activities since the fall. Read reviews and watch a video intro of Symphony No. 2 "Water" which the ESO premiered in late February. The ESO also performed The Great Northern Diver on its children's series; Achilles & Scamander for the 4-6 education concerts; and will perform Whirlwind on its K-3 education concerts in May. The Ottawa Youth Orchestra took Spring on its recent tour to The Netherlands and Belgium. The Alcan String Quartet will perform Traces of a Silent Landscape on April 9 in Jonquière, Québec, along with projected photos of winter scenes taken by members of its audience. Finally, download Lessons in Practicality [PDF] which I wrote for CMC's Prairie Sounds about my experiences as a resident composer.
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Summer Summary |
SEP 2012—I've finished my latest commmission for the ESO. Whirlwind, a "dazzling" overture, will be premiered on Sep 23 conducted by Lucas Waldin. My coaching of the two participants in the ESO's Young Composers' Project culminated, after six months, with the premieres of their works at Symphony under the Sky over the Labour Day weekend. Watch a video interview with me and the two high school students here (they play excerpts arranged for piano four hands). My article on Nielsen's harmony has appeared in Carl Nielsen Studies, Vol 5. Read it here, even before it's released in print (download the PDF). Tony Kilgannon, writing for the Ontario Arts Review, had the following to say about a performance of Achilles & Scamander in July at the Brott Festival in Hamilton, ON:
"This sometimes eccentric tone poem served as a great tune-up for the concert-goer’s ear, with its heavy rhythms, great dynamic shifts, and hugely contrasting sections. I found the sonic blasts from the percussion instruments absolutely riveting throughout, referencing powerful Russian masterpieces like Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture, and the Ravel orchestration of Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition."
The ESO performs it again on Oct 2, this time with William Eddins conducting. It opens for Béla Fleck playing his own banjo concerto! I'm now working on my second symphony, a 25-minute work that will be premiered in Feb.
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Lullaby at Carnegie Hall |
MAY 2012—On May 4 & 5, the ESO led by William Eddins gave the world premiere of my Lullaby. On May 8 they took it to Carnegie Hall in New York. Listen to the live recording archived on WQXR. What the critics had to say:
"Robert Rival’s concise Lullaby (2012) presupposes a fairly sophisticated baby: Its gentle textures and flowing themes occasionally yield surprising harmonic turns and briskly changing meters."
—Allan Kozinn, New York Times
"Rival’s Lullaby, inspired by the birth of his first child last summer, conjures moods that certainly beckon sleep, although Rival eschews a conventional triple meter like Brahms used, choosing instead a kind of narrative arc suggesting fleeting stages of consciousness drifting away. Those stages are as likely to feel anxiously propulsive as pleasantly soporific, and the effect is engaging."
—William Rankin, Globe & Mail
"Opening the program was Canadian composer Robert Rival's Lullaby. Written for the composer's infant son, it is true to its title, moving in gently rocking rhythms and creating a lulling, atmospheric dream world with slow melodies, subtle string glissandos and soft percussion effects."
—Michael Huebner, Birmingham News (Alabama)
"Things began delicately, serenely with Robert Rival’s Lullaby, a brief, rhythmically rich piece written for his infant son."
—Elizabeth Withey, Edmonton Journal
"...serenely surreal..."
—Lark Clark, CKUA radio on Lullaby
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