KENT GUSTAVSON :: JERUSALEM

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Concerto in Four Movements For Orchestra in the Round and Tape

The sounds on the tape were recorded on the streets of Israel and Palestine, mostly in Jerusalem, with a small hidden microphone in the year 1999, when there was a glimmer of hope for the peace process. Ehud Barak was elected to power, and was promising a new start. I was there at the celebration in Tel Aviv when he spoke to a hopeful crowd. And at 4AM, the celebrators left Rabin Square filled with broken bottles... as they walked away, their feet created a symphony of broken glass against the stones. A Palestinian mother just a few miles away sings a gentle lullaby to her son... "Fly away to sleep..."

I had no idea that the possibility of reconciliation was to disappear only a few months later, in the fall of 2000, with the beginning of the terrible state of things now.

I created this symphony to show that there was a way towards 'peace', but it meant going through 'walls'... a wall of wood being the simplest -- families not trusting each other -- individuals afraid of each other. A wall of stone -- every building in Jerusalem is made of stone. Traditions, like stone, can't be easily broken down. And then there are walls of steel -- new, girded walls that withstand heat and cold -- the walls of technology -- the rich building their skyscrapers next to the wood and the stone. And finally, the walls of glass.

I thought I understood the world. I thought that this was the answer. If you choose the wall of glass, you can break through, with a lot of fear, and a lot of pain. I thought this was the answer.

I never knew that they would truly build a wall. A cement wall as tall as the sun. To keep everyone in, or everyone out. And who feels safer behind this cement wall? Even the hopes of the broken glass in 1999 are gone now. Where is the 'peace?' Is there justice in Jerusalem? Is there security in our world? Are we all safe behind our walls?

The orchestral score is a graphic score, and easily played by an amateur symphony or ensemble in two sittings. Premiered in May, 2000 by the Middlebury College Orchestra, Evan Bennett conducting.