The Arkansas Symphony Orchestra recently debuted a new work by Dr. Thomas Dempster, a music instructor at the Arkansas School for Mathematics, Sciences and the Arts.
Members of the ASO performed “Canticle of Saint Frances Xavier Cabrini” during the March 1 River Rhapsodies concert at the Clinton Presidential Center in Little Rock. The series presents collections of chamber pieces that demonstrate the versatility of the performers beyond the orchestral stage. The piece was composed for a septet consisting of flute, oboe, clarinet, bassoon, violin, viola and cello, Dempster said.
The piece honors Saint Frances Xavier Cabrini, an Italian-born nun who started her own order and came to the United States at the end of the 19th century to build schools, hospitals and orphanages initially for Italian immigrants, but later for all immigrants, Dempster said. She became a naturalized U.S. citizen and was eventually canonized as the first saint from the United States. She is the patron saint of immigrants as well as hospital workers and administrators.
Dempster began composing the work around January 2020 at the request and commission from Susan Bell Leon, the principal bassoonist in the Arkansas Symphony Orchestra. Dempster has served as a longtime substitute bassoonist for the ASO. The work was initially supposed to be performed in February 2021, but the premiere was pushed back a year as the COVID-19 pandemic began forcing organizations to cancel events.
That allowed Dempster to make some revisions and address other considerations for the piece. He completed the final draft in mid-December 2021.
The work uses various folk song melodies from Lithuania and Italy. It is about 12 minutes long in three connected sections that explores the various color and rhythm possibilities of the seven instruments, Dempster said.
“The piece does create the various senses of loneliness, isolation, challenge and struggle, and ultimately, clarity of purpose and a sense of transcendence, perhaps reaching for the divine and the transformative,” Dempster said. “The folk songs weave in and out of the texture — masked, altered and transformed at first, but becoming direct, unapologetic and the inspiration for further moments in the work.”
Dempster had the opportunity to attend a few rehearsals to work with the musicians to shape the work, correct details on his end, and to try new and novel approaches to some aspects of the piece before its premiere.
“I was able to hear the performance from the audience at the Clinton Center. The premiere went exceedingly well, and the audience received it rather warmly. It was performed sensitively, thoughtfully, lovingly, even prayerfully at times, and I couldn’t have asked for better or kinder musicians with which to work,” Dempster said.
Dempster said that he has had about 80 pieces premiered in which he didn’t take part in as a musician on state. He said early in his career premieres were nerve-wracking but not as much now.
“I remember almost breaking a chair in front of me in a recital hall when I was an undergraduate. Twenty-five years later, I’m much more relaxed about things, though I do tend to look around the audience to see what other listeners are saying with their faces,” Dempster said.