Dear Friends;
It is with great sadness that we inform you of the loss of one of our commissioned composers, Raymond Wojcik, who passed away early this morning. Some of you have met Raymond over the years as he attended many of our concerts and has been a great friend and champion of our trio. His commissioned work, "Between Worlds", was premiered on April 10, 2010 on our "Remembrance and Rebirth" program in Ridgewood. The work was written during a period of time when he was relatively healthy and was intended to describe the journey his emotions took when it was first revealed that he had been diagnosed with cancer. From mystery, anguish and sadness to a final transcendent state the piece mirrors the trajectory of his emotions throughout his illness and treatment. Unfortunately the disease did return and has finally taken its toll.
We recorded "Between Worlds" just last summer and it has been released on our most recent CD, New American Masters, Volume 5. We had already planned to include the work on our concert this fall, Friday November 7th at Bergen Community College as part of our program, "Music Born of Adversity", and had hoped he would still be with us at that time. You may read more about Raymond, his music, and hear an excerpt from the piece here.
His long-time close friend and colleague, Paul M. Somers (also a PV commissioned composer and tremendous supporter of PV) will be co-hosting John Hammel's internet radio program on HomeGrownRadioNJ in his memory on Sunday evening from 9:00 to midnight. We hope you will tune in and hear "Between Worlds" in honor of our friend.
As our tribute today to Raymond we have provided you with an audio link of his "Love Song" (originally for flute, voice & piano) which is not available commercially. [We recorded this last summer also in hopes we would be able to fit it onto this most recent CD but there was not room for it unfortunately.] He made a transcription of this piece just for Palisades Virtuosi in 2010 and we performed it for him at our NAM5 CD Release Party on April 1, 2014.
Please enjoy this track and remember our friend with peace and joy. We will miss him so very much!
Sincerely,
Margaret, Don & Ron
Palisades Virtuosi
SPECIAL NOTE: the podcast of this tribute program is available to listen to at the following link:
Recorded August 2013 - Clubhouse Studios, Rhinebeck, NY
Producer: John Ostendorf, Engineer: Paul Antonell