Black Holes and Other Highlighted Works
Powehi: The Darkest Source of Unending Creation (2020) for Narrator and Two Pianos – Premiering in April, 2022 featuring actor Pamela Fields and pianists Sandrine Erdely-Sayo and Cynthia Raim
Powehi (a Hawaiian term for black hole) was commissioned by the Piano on the Rocks International Festival, Sedona, AZ and will premiere in the spring of 2022. This work is a dramatic evocation of the astronomical mysteries of dark matter, dark energy and black holes themselves.
The power of two pianos immerses the audience in lush, almost orchestral sound, as the narration is spoken. Rich harmonies, delicate melodies, moments of joyous dance and the melding of complex musical structures evoke the power of the universe’s vast energies.
Night of Nights (1990 rev 2019) for Soprano and Piano
This piece is based on the German poem “Nacht der Nächte” by Nobel Prize laureate Nelly Sachs and dates from the immediate post World War II period. Sachs was a German Jew who managed to escape to Sweden and lived there the rest of her life. “Nacht der Nächte” manages in a few lines to express deep loss and desolation with the hope of eventual redemption. Rubin translated the poem herself and included some German fragments from the poem. The musical language of the piece is atonal and evokes the poem’s haunting loss and redemption.
Chiaroscuro II (2016) for Wind Ensemble
This piece was commissioned by Dr. Brian Kaufman, director of the University of Maryland, Baltimore County Wind Ensemble. The term ‘chiaroscuro’ is used in painting to refer to the dramatic treatment of light and shade. Rubin exploits the many colors of wind, brass, percussion and piano to contrast and blend with each other. The piece is highly rhythmic and builds to a rollicking climax where the full power of the brass instruments hold sway. Listen
Stolen Gold for Violin and Fixed Media (2008) and for Oboe and Fixed Media (1996)
This work was originally written for baroque oboe virtuoso Debra Nagy, and later revised for modern oboist, Patricia Morehead. Dr. Airi Yoshioka requested a version for violin in 2008. The instrumentalist plays poignant lyrical melodies against the electronic background which has three distinct elements: high sustained pitches, a shimmering ‘cloud’ of bell-like tones, and sweeping glissandi. The electronic portion was created at the Brooklyn College Center for Computer Music where Rubin studied with Charles Dodge and Curtis Bahn. Listen-oboe. Listen-violin.
Dreaming Fire, Tasting Rain (1995) for Flute (piccolo), Clarinet (bass clarinet), Violin, Cello and Piano
This piece was written while Rubin was working on her Ph.D at Princeton University. The Nash Ensemble of London premiered the work at Princeton in 1996. The images of fire and rain are translated into a variety of musical textures – sometimes serene and sometimes jagged and thorny. In the opening, heterophonic or layered melodies surge and then subside. A middle section begins with the lonely sound of the piccolo against spiky cello pizzicati and then builds to a driving pulsed rhythm. The music then eases into a lyrical cello melody against a background of rolling piano chords and flute and violin countermelodies.