On Monday night, UNC music professors Mimi Solomon and Heidi Radtke performed "In Remembrance," a story of grief and memory told through a piano and three saxophones, which Radtke alternated between.
The hour-long faculty concert was held in Hill Hall’s Moeser Auditorium. Each piece they played was either dedicated to or written for someone by its original composers.
“The idea of memory and grieving and thinking of people we've lost is kind of universal,” Solomon said. “So, of course, there are people in my life that I have lost, and of course, this program evokes all of that.”
Radtke carefully curated the setlist to put forth a message as a tribute to her late grandmother; the production’s first song, "And Everything is Still" by Andy Scott was also played by Radtke at her grandmother’s memorial service. She also ended the show with a rendition of "Feast of Memory" by JoAnne Harris, a song that Harris dedicated to the memory of her grandmothers.
“I kept gravitating toward these pieces that told stories,” Radtke said. “It seemed to just be tied together with either a strong memory or working through a process, and it sort of just built.”
Before each piece that Radtke and Solomon played, Radtke spoke about each song’s history to the audience: specifically, who or what the composer was remembering. The concert was not only a remembrance of all the figures that Radtke and Solomon have lost, but also a tribute to the talented musicians that came before them, and the stories they shared.
The concert included seven songs, one of which was a three-part melody titled "Two Elegies Framing a Shout" by Mark-Anthony Turnage — beginning and ending in softer segments with a climactic middle section. The duo interpreted songs covering a wide range of years, including "Songe de Coppélius" by Florent Schmitt, which was written in 1908, being played just before "Resonance" by Rahsaan Barber, written in 2024.
Radtke used three saxophones throughout the show: the tenor, soprano and alto. The variation depended on each song, as Radtke intended to showcase each instrument’s unique sound. For one song, Radtke played the alto saxophone into a microphone, as she wished for the crowd to hear its intricacies.
Most of the songs were played in tenor saxophone, Radtke’s signature instrument.
