Composer Derrick Skye.
On Dec. 8, Music Director Andreas Delfs led the Rochester (NY) Philharmonic Orchestra in the world premiere of Derrick Skye’s “A Rage of Peace” on a program shared with Brahms’s “German Requiem.” Commissioned by the Rochester Philharmonic, the work features text by Kiara Skye, sung at the premiere by soprano Jasmine Habersham. Daniel J. Kushner writes in Rochester City Newspaper that Skye’s “melting pot of musical languages includes medieval and Renaissance vocal music, Indian classical rhythms, Persian classical melodies, and even hip-hop and pop-influenced phrases…. The melodic runs in the woodwinds and strings became so complex and ornate that they began to sound a bit like Mozartean themes. This musical catharsis soon tapered off, and the initial contemplative tone of the piece returned.”
