A Free People was commissioned by the Mimir Chamber Music Festival, Seattle Chamber Music Society, and Charlottesville Chamber Music Festival for the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. The first and last movements set the Declaration’s opening and closing words, while the second movement deals with its longest, yet least often talked about, section: a list of grievances against a cruel and tyrannical king. Musical references from the Revolutionary era abound, including drum and fife music, bugle calls, the British patriotic song Rule Britannia (which is also the opening theme of Beethoven’s Wellington’s Victory), and a paraphrase of The Star-Spangled Banner. The unnarrated third movement, “Of Bondage and Freedom,” reflects the history of the American people up to the present day, asking if we have lived up to the ideals of the Declaration over the last quarter of a millennium.
Note: The narrator does not have to read musical notation to perform this work.