| Penka Kouneva (born 1967 in Sofia, Bulgaria) is a winner of the Aaron Copland Award (2000) and a Meet the Composer Fellowship (2001). She is also a Sundance Film Composer Fellow (2001) and winner of the North Carolina Arts Council and the Aspen Festival Composer Fellowships. Her classical music is featured on CD's by Albany Records, Koch, Gasparo and Capstone labels. Her commissions (two string quarters, orchestral, chamber and choral pieces) are continuously performed across U.S., Europe and Australia. Ms. Kouneva's interest in combining influences from art and vernacular music, from her Bulgarian heritage and contemporary styles has resulted in a distinct and compelling artistic voice. Since starting a freelance composer's career in Los Angeles in 1999, Ms. Kouneva has composed the award-winning scores to many films including Shadows, The Picture of Dorian Gray, Earth is Heaven, and American Storytellers. Ms. Kouneva's two-act music-theater STEEL: John Henry & the Shaker (written with playwright Leon Martell in the style of blues and gospel) was premiered at HOT PROPERTIES [INSIDE] the Ford Amphitheatre in Los Angeles in 2002. As a resident composer of Archipelago Theatre of North Carolina (1991-95), she wrote music for Archipelago's award-winning theater productions The Abdication, Kaspar, King Ubu, Escurial, Calamity Jane, and Cassandra's Lullaby. In 1997, Penka received the first-ever Ph.D. degree in the newly-established Doctoral program in composition at Duke University. She has studied composition with Stephen Jaffe at Duke, and with the Dutch composer Louis Andriessen whom she credits as the most illuminating influence on her style. Penka graduated from the same National High School of Music in Sofia as Katia Popov. She loves living in Los Angeles, enjoys various outdoors activities, and is an avid mountain hiker. String Quartet No.1 by Penka Kouneva I. Fiddlers (Scherzo) II. Nestinarki (Allegro) III. Incantation (Largo) Program Note String Quartet No.1 was commissioned by the University of Massachusetts Fine Arts Center in celebration of its 20th Anniversary Season. It was co-commissioned by Arizona State University, Michigan State Universityıs Wharton Center, Duke Universityıs Institute for the Arts, The Ensemble Chamber Music Society of Indianapolis and The Raleigh Chamber Music Guild. It was written for, and dedicated to the Lark Quartet. I wrote the quartet in 1995 when I was interested in fusion of art music, pop and folk traditions, and past and contemporary styles. I used classical forms (though the quartet cycle of movements is humorously inverted, starting with Scherzo and ending with Largo) and minimalist techniques. The first movement is playful and exuberant. In it, music is a jam-session, a community experience, or a game, where musicians trade solos and accompanimental patterns. The second movement is restless and dramatic. Dancing barefoot over hot embers to the accompaniment of fast music, is an ancient rite performed in Bulgaria (called Nestinarki ). I thought "Nestinarki" was a fitting metaphor for being a creative artist today. The third movement features a melody over a slowly moving chord progression and a drone. The music is a private experience -- sensual, intense and spiritual, and was influenced by folk music practices and by the medieval chant. *** Composerıs Address: P.O. Box 931106 Los Angeles CA 90093 tel. (323) 469-0734 (home/office) cell (323) 753-7956 kouneva@earthlink.net |