Betsey Biggs

For flute, bass clarinet, tenor saxophone, percussion, piano, violin, and cello; premiered by the Grand Valley State University New Music Ensemble across Badlands, Wind Cave, Yellowstone, and Grand Teton National Parks in July 2016; also performed as part of New Music Detroit’s annual music marathon, Strange Beautiful Music IX. 7 minutes, 34 seconds.

Teewinot, a 2016 work for chamber ensemble, was commissioned by the acclaimed Grand Valley State University New Music Ensemble, in commemoration of the National Park System’s centennial celebration. With funding from the National Endowment for the Arts, eight composers were selected to respond to a national park with a new composition.

I chose Grand Teton National Park, and spent much time combing through natural histories of the park. Teewinot (pronounced TEE-win-aht) is a mountain set within Grand Teton National Park, a landscape formed by earthquakes, glaciers, and animals. The three movements of Teewinot are named after these three forces, and the music is structured as a sort of sonic time-lapse of the history of the land, a bundle of musical possibilities set within a larger structure. Bass drums imitate calving glaciers; flutes sing dipper songs. After learning the names of the most common birds and other animals in the area, I transcribed dozens of their sounds and songs.

Teewinot was performed several times during a July 2016 tour of the National Park system in Grand Teton, Yellowstone, Wind Cave, and Badlands National Parks, as well as Montana’s Billings Public Library, and also received a performance at New Music Detroit’s “Strange Beautiful Music IX” music marathon later that year. The tour was also profiled on NPR’s radio show, Performance Today. You can read more about the tour on the ensemble's website.

After completing tours of twenty commissioned works in both 2014 and 2016, the ensemble chose eleven works to record for their record release, Dawn Chorus, including Teewinot. They recorded all the music over three days at Solid Sound in Ann Arbor, Michigan and Silas Brown at Legacy Sound expertly mastered the recording, which was partially funded by a Project Grant from New Music USA. Dawn Chorus was released by Innova Recordings in 2020 to strong reviews by The New Yorker, the San Francisco Chronicle, “New Sounds” on WNYC, and others, and was listed by music critic Ted Gioia as one of the 100 Best Albums of 2020. It is distributed by Naxos.

Read more about the Dawn Chorus project here.

CREDITS

composer: Betsey Biggs

performers: Grand Valley State University New Music Ensemble

GRANTS, AWARDS, COMMISSIONS

Grand Valley State University New Music Ensemble commission ($3,750) for NEA-funded National Park Centennial Project.

RECORDINGS

2020: Dawn Chorus (Betsey Biggs, "Teewinot") released by the Grand Valley State University New Music Ensemble: Innova Records.

SELECTED REVIEWS

(See all reviews on GVSU New Music Ensemble's website)

2020: Ted Gioia, The One Hundred Best Albums of 2020. The Honest Broker, December 1, 2020.

2020: Joshua Kosman, “Music inspired by America’s national parks,” San Francisco Chronicle, May 27, 2020.

2020: Steve Smith, “GVSU New Music Ensemble: “Dawn Chorus,” The New Yorker, May 1, 2020.

2020: John Schaefer, "New Releases, March 2020," New Sounds, New York, NY: WNYC, March 31, 2020.

PERFORMANCES AND EXHIBITIONS

(More details about all performances can be found here.)

2016: Strange Beautiful Music IX music marathon, Wasserman Projects, Detroit, MI, USA.

2016: Badlands National Park, South Dakota, USA (July 1 and 2).

2016: Wind Cave National Park, South Dakota, USA (July 3).

2016: Billings Public Library, Billings, Montana, USA (July 5).

2016: Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming, USA (July 6 and 7).

2016: Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming, USA (July 8 and 9).

PERFORMANCE PRESS

(2016: “Inspiration from the National Parks System,” Performance Today (NPR), August 19, 2016.)