This Friday, May 17, 2013 at 8 PM, the Akropolis Reed Quintet will perform on the Detroit Chamber Winds and Strings’ Nightnotes Series. Included on the program will be a reed quintet and tape piece composed by TIMARA fourth-year Eli Stine, which features pre-recorded interviews and poems read by Alzheimer’s and dementia sufferers. 

Eli on the collaboration: “Through an ongoing collaboration between Detroit Chamber Winds and Strings and the University of Michigan, I was asked by the Akropolis Quintet to compose a piece for electronics and reed quintet (the first piece with electronics that they have performed) on the theme of “Unraveling.” I chose to center the piece around the loss of communication and memory caused by Alzheimer’s Disease and dementia. The piece is in 5 movements, each movement roughly corresponding to one of the five stages of grief. The content of the instrumental parts is motivic, and development occurs from these different motives being transformed, lost, suddenly remembered, and, ultimately, forgotten. The electro-acoustic playback portion of the piece is made from dozens of recordings from around 20 people reading the writings of caretakers of people suffering Dementia/Alzheimer’s disease, caretakers themselves, and Alzheimer’s patients. The title of the piece, “Forget,” refers both to the act of actively losing one’s memories and also passively, tragically, forgetting a loved one’s personality after they are affected by Alzheimer’s. The piece is being premiered May 17th in Detroit and will be recorded in June.” 

Friday’s concert will be held at the Hagopian World of Rugs on 850 S. Old Woodward Ave., Birmingham, MI 48009. There will be a reception at 7:30, with the concert following shortly after at 8 PM. Learn more about composer Eli Stine. – MC