2024 Program Guide | Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music

CABRILLO FESTIVAL OF CONTEMPORARY MUSIC 36 IN THE WORKS PROGRAM NOTES hunting technique wherein they create an artificial “net” of bubbles around a school of fish and use their deafeningly loud voices to stun them, causing them to swim directly upwards. The whales gather underneath and explode through the surface with their mouths wide open, a terrifying, sublime, and breathtaking sight. This piece is my attempt to capture the experience in the orchestral medium—like the whales’ feeding method, orchestral music can only be accomplished through intense and clever cooperation from a synergetic whole. —Ella Kaale Keep Moving (2024) Daixuan Ai (b. 1998) [World Premiere] In the past few years, I have grieved the loss of people who were once close to me. The past we had shared, and the future I had envisioned with them, is now nothing but a void. Instead of moving forward, I found myself wanting to be left behind in the past when everything seemed to be alright before crumbling. I found myself wanting to pretend that I could hold on to an image or an idea of what I had wished could become reality. But somewhere during the hopelessness and depression, I’ve reminded myself that there are many new stories in life yet to be written. If I could find happiness in the past, then I can find it again in the future. There are still people, animals, and things left for me to love, to cherish: things to make life meaningful. What I find beautiful now is people’s ability to go through loss and grief, and to come out of the dark tunnel with light on the other side. This piece is written for the people we have lost, the heartbreak we have felt, and the courage we have gathered time and time again to pick ourselves back up and keep moving. —Daxuan Ai Puzzle Box (2024) Nick Bentz (b. 1994) [World Premiere] Some of my earliest memories are of intricate boxes. My father, a furniture maker, often restores antique pieces, and I remember being fascinated by wardrobes and desks that had secret drawers and spaces. These are often only accessible by putting one’s hands in the right spot with the right pressure, a type of haptic code. In writing Puzzle Box , I wanted to create a work that pays homage to these beautifully compact pieces, where one has to explore around an object and test it in various ways until a hidden passageway opens. Puzzle Box was written for the Cabrillo Festival as part of the 2024 Conductors / Composers Workshop and is dedicated to my father. —Nick Bentz Bubble-Net (2024) Ella Kaale (b. 2003) [World Premiere] Bubble-Net is inspired by a group of humpback whales I saw in Alaska. These whales were performing a highly complex and coordinated Proud to support the Cabrillo Festival with the microphones used for recording and broadcast of the 2023 season