ETUDE NO. 11: THE SINGER

Xavier Foley
(b. Marietta, GA, August 9, 1994)

Composed 2020; 4 minutes

Xavier wrote all twelve of his solo pieces during the first two years of the Covid-19 pandemic. “I just wrote music,” he says of the months without concerts. Many composers create their pieces at the piano. Xavier does things differently; he creates at the bass. “Some of it starts with improvisation,” he says. “So, I’ll put it all in my memory and then write it down later. I’ll see what I can do to combine different influences. Even for a concerto, I work it out on the bass, then write it down later.” That’s how he went about composing For Justice and Peace: a double concerto for violin, bass and strings, an emotionally wide-ranging piece inspired by the 400th anniversary of the first slave ship landing in North America. Two months ago, he premièred his three-movement solo bass concerto with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, with a second performance to follow with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra.

The Singer is a lyrical ballad where Xavier both sings a catchy little song (on his bass) and accompanies himself with stopped chords, bassline accompaniment, arpeggios, ornamentation and a lot of soul.