The Joyce Cycle

Born in Haifa in 1955, Israeli composer Ofer Ben-Amots gave his first piano concert at age nine and at age sixteen was awarded first prize in the Chet Piano Competition. Later, following composition studies with Joseph Dorfman at Tel Aviv University, he was invited to study at the Conservatoire de Musique in Geneva, Switzerland, and the Hochschule für Musik in Detmold, Germany. Upon his arrival in the United States in 1987, Ben-Amots studied with George Crumb at the University of Pennsylvania where he received his Ph.D. in music composition. Currently on the faculty of Colorado College, Dr. Ben-Amots is a professor of composition and music theory. Ben-Amots’ emotional and highly personal works have received international attention and more than one first prize at top competitions, including the 1994 Vienna International Competition for Composers. The interweaving of folk elements with contemporary textures, along with his unique imaginative orchestration, creates the haunting dynamic tension that permeates and defines Ben-Amots’ musical language. The Joyce Cycle was completed in 1986 and includes nine poems drawn from Joyce’s 36 texts titled Chamber Music (published in 1907). Those texts have been popular springboards for generations of composers; in particular, “Rain has fallen all the day” has been set to music by Samuel Barber, Karol Szymanowski, and Ross Lee Finney among other. Ben-Amots sought a neo-romantic musical style, entirely redolent of Mahler, in order to capture the archaic language in Joyce’s texts.

(c) Jason Stell