Tonight, the University Orchestra of the University of Missouri–St. Louis (UMSL) will premiere Dr. Barbara Harbach’s Jubilee Symphony at the Touhill Performing Arts Center. The symphony was commissioned by UMSL to celebrate the university’s 50th anniversary. Harbach is a professor of music at UMSL, and this is her fifth symphony.
“[I’m] thrilled to do it of course, and thrilled to write for our orchestra,” says Harbach. “I had carte blanche to do it, and I was just thrilled when I was asked. I was asked about 18 months ago, I guess, and I wrote this in December 2012.”
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Originally the piece was expected to premiere in the spring semester of 2013, but plans changed. “I wrote it in December of 2012 because we thought it was going to be premiered in Spring semester, but the University had just premiered my A State Divided, so we decided that it would be better done this fall,” says Harbach. “So I actually got it done earlier than necessary. Deadlines are good—nothing like a good sense of panic to get something done. Luckily I didn’t have to do that.”
The symphony has three movements, each based on a different aspect of UMSL’s unique culture. The first movement is named “Bellerive” in reference to the grounds that the university was built on, parts of which once included the Bellerive Country Club.
“It was easy to come up with the names of the three movements and then just write it,” says Harbach. “We live in Bellerive Acres, so I look out over where the golf course was, and where the old clubhouse used to be. The clubhouse lasted until 1978, from 1963.”
The first movement also tries to indicate the amount of cooperation and planning it took to found UMSL. “It took so many partners to get this university going,” says Harbach. “The university has about 27 municipalities that touch on our land, and so all of them had to be in agreement. So, I made this a conversation among all the people and different facets that had to make this work. So that was the first movement, ending with one voice, of course, because it all came together.”
The second movement, “Mirth Day Fiesta,” calls to mind the annual celebration UMSL holds each spring for the students with food, games, carnival rides and an evening concert. “[Mirth Day] is absolutely unique; there’s no other,” Harbach explains. “It’s sort of in–between. It’s a festival; it’s a carnival, a Cinco de Mayo. I even have mariachi band sounds in there, and so it’s just multi-ethnicities, multi-cultural, all sorts of things. That was another easy one to do because that’s just ours; no one else has that.”
The final movement, “Tritons Ascending,” calls on UMSL’s mascot, the Triton.
“The third movement starts [with] very low strings and low in the woodwinds and the brass to symbolize he came from the sea,” says Harbach. “Triton is the son of Poseidon, so comes from the sea, and the whole movement is moving upward towards the surface of the water into UMSL. So I have all the brass kind of leading Triton into UMSL. The movement starts very soft and ends up ‘blastissimo.’” Harbach laughs and adds, “That’s a good technical term for it.”
UMSL’s University Orchestra has been preparing for the premiere for the last several weeks. “I went to a rehearsal and I was so pleased with the student performance,” says Harbach. “The rehearsal was so good, and the conductor, Robert Charles Howard, is doing a great job. We had talked about it over the summer, so we had a great time and I’m just so pleased about what the students are doing. And that’s what it’s all about. It’s a joy to write for our students.”
Having written for many musical genres, Harbach is reluctant to choose a favorite. “This is going to sound funny,” she begins. “Whatever I’m working on is my favorite. I just kind of pass it around. It’s fun.”
Harbach has now written six symphonies, and her third through sixth symphonies, including the Jubilee Symphony, are scheduled to be recorded to CD by the London Philharmonic Orchestra later this month. She will head to London in about a week to be present for the recording sessions.
She does admit to highly enjoying writing for and having the UMSL students perform her works. “Sometimes [students will] bring up things that I had not thought of, so it’s a really good reciprocal relation,” Harbach says. “I really enjoy that. It is really very special.”
The concert will take place tonight, Wednesday October 8, at 7:30 p.m. in the Anheuser–Busch Performance Hall at the Touhill Performing Arts Center on the UMSL campus. It is a free event. Visit touhill.org for more information.
