““Bell Drum Towers” is a fantasy piece in which Mr. Zhou imagines the custom in ancient China where drums and bells in public towers signaled the arrival of evening. At first the music, which deftly melds traditional Chinese and contemporary Western elements, provides a placid, hazy background: gentle glissandos, soft scratchy tones in the strings, delicate flickers from the woodwinds.
Then fleeting musical gestures — a sudden scampering figure, a swelling chord — bobble up, like the random thoughts that penetrate the mind when you are trying to meditate. But soon these fragments coalesce into thematic lines, drums tap and ripple, strings break into frenetic bursts. Sometimes, during subdued moments, the drums and bells almost seem to be playing themselves, as if gusts of wind were rustling through the tower.”
Mr. Zhou will be in South Dakota this weekend to hear the South Dakota Symphony rehearse and perform this piece. I’m very excited to be the percussionist for this performance.
