Conversation with Collaborative Artists Eric Davis and Rachel Lopez

San Francisco Bach Choir Managing Director, Sharon Gustavson, spoke with composer Eric Davis and choreographer Rachel Lopez to discuss their exciting new work created especially for the Bach Choir. Thanksgiving for Heroes, for chorus, soprano, baritone, piano and dancers, was premiered by the SFBC on May 15 and 16, 2010.

SHARON GUSTAVSON: The combination of choir and dance is fascinating. What was the genesis of this work?

ERIC DAVIS: In May of 2009, Rachel and I premiered a dance piece entitled And Then There Were Three at Rio Hondo College in Whittier, CA. This work was directly inspired by an extraordinary event that we both experienced earlier that year. Sadly, my step-brother, Curt Massey, a Culver City Police Officer, died in a fatal car accident on his way to work in January. His funeral, organized by the Culver City and Los Angeles Police Departments, was a deeply moving and awe-inspiring memorial tribute.

In creating And Then There Were Three, we wanted to honor the law enforcement community for their service and for the remarkable manner in which they pay respect to the fallen heroes among them. In that piece we recalled the seemingly endless procession of emergency vehicles with their homage of flashing lights and sirens, the hook-and-ladder arch with an enormous hanging flag that served as a doorway to the cemetery, the four horses with only three riders, the piercing strains of “Amazing Grace” from the bagpipe band, the hundreds of peace officers from many counties throughout Southern California, the twenty-one gun salute, and the “Missing Man” formation of four helicopters that passed overhead until one peeled away, which inspired the title of the work.

After And Then There Were Three was performed, we wanted to develop the theme further in another dance piece, and for a larger community venue. When the horrible events occurred that took the lives of the four Oakland Police Department officers shortly after Curt’s death, we had a long conversation with SFBC Musical and Artistic Director Corey Jamason, about the importance of the arts community expressing our gratitude for those in public service, and particularly to those who risk their lives every day to protect us and keep the peace. This sentiment naturally extends to all people in the Police, Sheriff, Fire, National Guard and the military. Together with Corey, we envisioned this concert, and our new piece, Thanksgiving for Heroes, as one small way in which we all could collectively say ‘thank you’ to people who dedicate their lives to this type of public service.

SHARON: What were the primary ideas or themes that guided the creation of this new work?

ERIC: We spoke at length about the importance of including all people of service who risk their lives in their everyday employment, not just one group or another. Last year in Southern California, we were reminded of the service of people in Fire Departments across the country when two people lost their lives in the Station fire. And of course, we must not forget that men and women are serving our country, risking and giving their lives every day, in Iraq and Afghanistan.

RACHEL LOPEZ: Yes, we expanded our concept for Thanksgiving for Heroes to include and express our unequivocal support and gratitude for American military personnel and their families, because we do not want to allow the extraordinary valor, honor and duty of these individuals to be forgotten, ever, in the midst of the ongoing war of ideas taking place on the home front.

ERIC: The music and dance is all designed to express this profound feeling that we both have for all people of service, for their courage and for their willingness to risk their lives to make the world a better place. The texts by Edwin Markham that we are using were written during and just after World War I and are dedicated to the heroism of soldiers in that war. However, we selected these verses specifically with the intention that they could be used as a symbol of heroic action in order to celebrate all heroes in each branch of public service today in which people risk their lives to protect the lives of others.        

SHARON: What specifically about Edwin Markham’s texts inspired you?

ERIC: The music for And Then There Were Three was more a sound collage than a musical composition per se. Given the fact that Rachel and I were now going to be working with a choir, we knew that the words in the score would generate the entire direction of the music and movement. In looking for suitable texts, I found an article on the front page of the New York Times from November 29, 1918 that read All Creeds Join in Thanksgiving. It turns out that two weeks after the Armistice at the end of World War I, civic leaders and religious figures from all over the world came together in New York City to celebrate the end of war and call for world peace on Thanksgiving Day. The article also reported that on that day, Edwin Markham, author of “The Man with the Hoe,” delivered a lecture at the Swedenborgian Church and “read a poem ‘Thanksgiving for Heroes’ written for the occasion.” Markham was an important American poet working in the late 19th and early 20th century, primarily known for his work in the social reform movement. And he began his career in the San Francisco Bay Area, which we also liked very much.

However, when we looked at Markham’s books of poetry, we could not find a poem with the title, “Thanksgiving for Heroes.” The title by itself had intrigued us because it seemed to evoke in the simplest terms the sentiments that we most wanted to convey: of gratitude for the people that risk their lives to make the world a better place. Instead, we found several poems written during the same time period that seemed as if they might have been the poem we were looking for, perhaps gathered later under a different title. So, it seemed like a good plan to construct a text out of various parts of these poems that would suit the purpose of our project. We decided to name our piece “Thanksgiving for Heroes” as a way of recovering Markham’s poetic verse at that crucial moment in world history and allowing his visionary spirit and inspirational language to lift and direct our efforts to express our own gratitude. The music and dance are an elaboration of Markham’s words in the sense that they provided a constant source of rich imagery, pathos, humility, and lofty sentiment for us to reflect and interact with. These were the qualities that we most wanted to evoke in our work.

SHARON: Eric, what considerations or difficulties did you encounter setting words to a work intended for dance? In what ways is composing a work intended as a dance different from composing concert music?

ERIC: Composing for both chorus and dancers presented a number of challenges and opportunities. My first concern was to write music that carried a lot of energy, even in the slow sections. I decided fairly early in the process that the piano would be the engine for a lot of this energy and that it should propel the chorus forward to some extent. We decided that the size and austerity of the church sanctuary at Calvary Presbyterian would require as many as six dancers, and so the music would need to have enough drive and locomotion to justify their collective movement in that large, open space. The opening section for piano was my first attempt to capture this kinetic quality with a large sweeping gesture rising gradually toward a big climax at the chorus’ first entrance, and it informed a lot of the writing throughout. But as I said, even the slower sections had to be created in broad brushstrokes. I wanted to make sure above all that the music would inspire the dancers to move and to always keep in mind the fact that this is a dance piece. When you create music for dance, the movement is of foremost importance. In no way is the dance ornamental or decorative; it is the absolute reason for the existence of the work. Therefore, the phrases I was creating were each designed with a shape that would be readily felt by the dancers and allow them and Rachel to create something that would captivate the audience at all times. Writing for chorus actually helped me in this way. I am actually surprised to find that choreographers are not asked to collaborate with choirs more because in retrospect it seems like a very natural complement. 

SHARON: Rachel, what considerations, difficulties or challenges does a choreographer face staging a dance to vocal music? Does the presence of a text generate, inspire, or possibly constrict ideas by its specificity?

RACHEL: There is no doubt that choreographing to vocal music with a text limits the freedom with which you can work. It definitely sets a boundary and confines the dance in that the movement must respond to the ideas being presented by the words in the same way that the music does. But I like to work within certain parameters, and working with ideas that are heartfelt certainly sparks my creativity.

Edwin Markham’s poetry is wonderful in that it conjures so many beautiful images and has such a powerful tone. The movement needs to match his lofty vision and the grandiose quality of his language. There is tremendous beauty in the antique rhetoric of his verse, a flowery eloquence that the dancers must respond to, and I enjoy the process of discovering the quality of movement that best expresses what Markham is striving for in his poetry.

SHARON: In what other contexts have you collaborated?

RACHEL: Thanksgiving for Heroes is our fourth time working together. Apart from And Then There Were Three, we have created work for the Synapse Dance Theater and for Highways Performance Space, both in Los Angeles. Our work for Synapse, called Outdoor In, was subtitled: An Environmental Investigation Translated for Stage. As you can imagine, it was in many ways at the opposite end of the spectrum from what we have created for SFBC. The sound and movement were not at all of the bold, lyrical, expressive type that permeates Thanksgiving for Heroes. For that piece we collected sound and visual materials from a local theater in which the piece was to be performed by literally taking photos and recording everyday sounds around the building. With these materials, we created a multi-media depiction of the space primarily with musique concrete, pedestrian movement and photography. The contrast in these different contexts has been quite welcome and refreshing.

SHARON: Thank you both so much for sharing your thoughts with us. It makes the work of preparing this very special concert all the more meaningful. The San Francisco Bach Choir is deeply honored to present, and have a part in performing, Thanksgiving for Heroes.