PROGRAM NOTE

Elysium was commissioned by the Hawaii Youth Symphony to celebrate the organization’s 55th Anniversary, which also coincided with Ludwig van Beethoven’s 250th Birthday. The work was composed to feature the Hawaii Youth Symphony I with the Beginning Strings and Ukelele programs. The title is taken from Friedrich Schiller’s poem “An die Freude” which is famously used as the text in Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. The music quilts together fragments from themes, harmonies and rhythms used in the composers 5th, 6th, 7th and 9th Symphonies into a sonic landscape of fanfares.

Freude, schöner Götterfunken,
Tochter aus Elysium,
Wir betreten feuertrunken,
Himmlische, dein Heiligtum!
Deine Zauber binden wieder
Was die Mode streng geteilt;
Alle Menschen werden Brüder
Wo dein sanfter Flügel weilt.

- From “An die Freude” (1785) [Ode to Joy] by Friedrich Schiller

[Joy, beautiful spark of Divinity,
Daughter of Elysium,
We enter, drunk with fire,
Heavenly One, thy sanctuary!
Your magic binds again
What custom strictly divided;
All people become brothers,
Where your gentle wing abides.]