Christopher Coleman

Improvisations Approaching the Millennium  (1998)

​

variable duration

first performance ca. 10:00

 

Instrumentation

for 2 violins, 2 celli, flute, 2 clarinets, euphonium, yang qin, piano, percussion                       

                    (four players: 2 vibraphones, chimes, glockenspiel, crotales, doumbek)

 

Program note

Improvisations Approaching the Millennium was created in response to the rising public sense of anxiety concerning the impending millennium.  Fears both imagined (the end of the world) and real (possible Y2K computer bugs) were on everyone's mind, and this work was created to engage those feelings and concerns.  It was a time-dependent improvisational framework with fixed instrumentation of HKBU's Contemporary Music Workshop during 1998.  Improvisations Approaching the Millennium was premiered by the Workshop on November 20, 1998 at Hong Kong Baptist University'.

​