Synopsis

Let’s face it. Brevity and wit are not always qualities one associates with new music.

But today we offer a sample: this comic overture is less than five minutes long, and opens, as you just heard, with a Fellini-esque duet for piccolo and contrabassoon.

Quantum Quirks of a Quick Quaint Quark is a rather burlesque celebration of modern theoretical physics. Its alliterative title evokes those subatomic particles known as “quarks” that, we’re told, make up our universe. And, since this music changes time signature so often, perhaps Heisenberg’s “uncertainty principle” is thrown in for good measure.

The music is by Marga Richter, who was born on this date in 1926 in Reedsburg, Wisconsin. Richter received her early music training in Minneapolis, and then moved to New York’s Juilliard School. By the time of her death in 2020, she had composed over 75 works including an opera and two ballets, as well as two piano concertos and a variety of solo, chamber and symphonic works.

“Composing is my response to a constant desire to transform my perceptions and emotions into music … music is the way I speak to the silence of the universe,” Richter said.

Music Played in Today's Program

Marga Richter (1926-2020): Quantum Quirks of a Quick Quaint Quark; Czech Radio Orchestra; Gerard Schwarz; MMC 2006