Dayspring
(A Fanfare/Concertino for Guitar and Orchestra)
Quickly with Zest
Gently moving
Very Energetic
by
Dan Locklair (b. 1949)
Program Note
Dayspring was commissioned by the Second American Classical Guitar Congress (David Tanenbaum and Patricia Dixon, Congress President and Director respectively). Composed during the late summer and early autumn of 1988, Dayspring received its World Premiere on 13 June 1989 in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, with David Tanenbaum as the featured soloist and the Winston-Salem Piedmont Triad Symphony Orchestra (Peter Perret, Music Director). Dayspring is dedicated to my publishers at that time, Franco and Elvira Colombo.
Though in three short movements, Dayspring is played without pause. Against a backdrop of tom toms and string harmonics, the guitar soloist enters immediately with the movement’s primary (pentatonic) melodic material. Gradually all instruments of the orchestra enter to develop this idea, leading to a fanfare in dialogue between the brass and woodwind sections of the orchestra. After the guitar also presents the fanfare idea, the movement builds to a climax and begins to fold into the quiet middle movement. With muted strings throughout, the movement is largely a lyrical dialogue between the guitar and two instruments, flute and vibraphone. After the movement’s climax, the guitar introduces the first idea of the fast third movement. This section, which evokes the beginning of Dayspring, functions as a bridge to the movement’s primary idea. Playful in nature, dialogues abound between the guitar and all sections of the orchestra as the movement eventually culminates into a return of the opening movement’s fanfare idea, bringing Dayspring to a vibrant close.
Dan Locklair
Winston-Salem, NC
January 1988