"Why (?) Jacob" was originally written for chorus with piano and premiered in that format in 1979 in Mr. Asia's birthplace of Seattle, Washington. The orchestration premiering in this series was commissioned in honor of Israel's 60th birthday by the Tucson Chapter of the America-Israel Friendship League with generous support from the Leslie Grusin family, in memory of Butch (Leslie) Grusin. The title commemorates a friend from the composer's childhood who emigrated to Israel and died in military service.
In his own notes about the work, Mr. Asia describes the music as "elegiac, somewhat melancholic, and certainly nostalgic. It combines both the harshest of sounds (perhaps a gunshot is even present in the piece), as well as a soft, retiring tune that keeps reappearing. An episodic work, whose edges are blurred, it ends like a music box winding down, the sounds fading into oblivion."
Mr. Asia is currently Professor of Composition and head of the Composition Department at the University of Arizona. He received a Master of Music from the Yale School of Music and is a recipient of numerous awards and grants, including Guggenheim, McDowell Colony, and Tanglewood Fellowships; four NEA Composers Grants; an M.B. Rockefeller Grant; a United Kingdom Fulbright Arts Award Fellowship; and composition prizes from ASCAP and BMI. Mr. Asia served as Composer in Residence with the Phoenix Symphony from 1991 to 1994.
© 2008 Tyler S. Clark
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