Description
Click here to view the perusal score for Campfire Stories. (Please note the performance notes have been updated since this export and will be slightly different in the purchased piece.)
Program notes:
How do we tell stories across space and time? In this electronic age, what elements of storytelling do we keep consistent with methods used long ago?
Despite frequently writing for instrumentations including prerecorded narrator, I am almost never asked to write for a live speaker in almost any capacity. As such, Campfire Stories is particularly special in my heart, as it has afforded me the opportunity to work collaboratively with Anabel to craft a textual-musical narrative that audiences will get to experience in the intimacy of a live performance setting, with the fixed media providing ambient worldbuilding as the two performers tell stories back and forth. To this end, the fixed media track is devoid of any intentional pitch content, instead made almost entirely of field recordings taken in California and Michigan.
It is my hope that future performers consider Campfire Stories as a creative vehicle through which they can explore interdisciplinary, immersive performances as much as their hearts desire.
Notes to the performers:
For your comfort and convenience, five seconds of silence have been included at the beginning of the fixed media track to facilitate smooth performances. This five seconds is accounted for in all listed timecodes.
Included in this score are two written copies of Anabel’s poetry: one that is the narrator’s score (with timecodes) and one without timecodes. We encourage you to include the copy without timecodes in full wherever you program Campfire Stories so audience members who may not be able to hear, understand, and/or process the words can still engage with them in another format.
When performing with live narration, the narrator should use the pages following the trumpet part marked “Narrator Score.” Although this is very similar to the courtesy copy of Anabel’s poetry we have provided for use in programs and marketing materials, the narrator score includes timecodes to approximate entrances. Do not read the timecodes out loud; they are provided for your reference. At the conclusion of each stanza, wait until the next specified timecode to begin narrating again.
In both the narrator and trumpet parts, I have declined to provide ending timecodes for each section. I am intentionally leaving these decisions more open-ended, because I believe that when both parts are performed live it is an opportunity for both performers to collaborate on the specific pacing they wish to present to their audiences. I do encourage both performers to mark your parts with additional timecode estimates as you discover how you wish to play the piece, so in rehearsal and performance you are able to track where you are in relation to the pacing you wish to use.
Although two sections of this piece, at the beginning and the end, call for the use of a wooden mute, I understand these are often expensive and time-consuming to procure (I don’t yet have one myself!), and I am completely fine with a mute substitution if you don’t have one in your collection. Ultimately, I am looking for a sound that is dark and dampened but still full—not tinny or hollow. Softone mutes, practice mutes, or similar may be good options to consider!
(Additional notes are included in the score)
Frequently asked: Does this piece require a narrator of a specific voice type?
Not at all! There are no directions about pitch or inflection in the score.
May I chop up your program notes?
Answer: You can certainly leave out the last line (beginning with “It is my hope…”), but please do leave the rest in place wherever possible. My notes are in many cases my only opportunity to speak directly to your audience. If limited program space is a consideration, consider linking them to this page via a QR code and/or reading them aloud for your audience during your set.
Can I download materials forever?
As long as my website is functional and the materials are stored there, yes. HOWEVER, I strongly encourage all performers to download all your performance materials immediately after purchase—technical difficulties can occur on both my end and yours, and I’d hate to leave you without your materials if a problem arises!
Known performances:
Got one I’m missing? Let me know! (And performers: if you see a name on here that you no longer use, I will fix it! Please send me an email with your old name, what you’d like it changed to, and where it appears.)
- 4/26/2025, Anabel Rattray, University of North Carolina School of the Arts, Winston-Salem, NC.
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