Theme of Stephen Paulus’ 9/11 Tucson piece still relevant

But Stephen Paulus’s “Prayers and Remembrances” had an even deeper message that continues to resonate today, said Eric Holtan, the ensemble’s founder and music director.

TCA changed its name to True Concord Voices & Orchestra in 2015, months ahead of releasing “Far in the Heavens: Choral Music of Stephen Paulus,” which included “Prayers and Remembrances” and other previously unrecorded works by the Minnesota composer.

Paulus, who participated in the recording, won a posthumous Grammy in 2016 for Best Contemporary Classical Composition for the work. He died in 2014, nearly a year before the album was released.

In his own words, Holtan recounts how “Prayers and Remembrances” came to life and why its message still resonates as the country marks 9/11’s 25th anniversary:

"I want to say it was 2009. We had just premiered a new, much shorter piece of Stephen’s in the 2008-2009 season. … I really had a great experience working with him on that short piece, and it occurred to me — it was that summer, I believe, of 2009 — that I wanted to do something special to mark the upcoming 10th anniversary of the 9/11 tragedies, and so I went back to Stephen, and that was not a hard sell at all. He was immediately on board with it in terms of doing a larger-scale work.

"I told him up front … I imagined two pieces on a concert: It's the Mozart Requiem, which is about looking back and remembering and honoring the dead; and then I wanted a new piece that helped us to move forward because it still felt eight, nine, 10, years after 9/11, that we were just still stuck in the past and finger-pointing as to who was to blame. I was looking for a piece of healing to bring us together in marking this significant milestone.

"We were going for (an emotional, hopeful balance), but we were also wanting to convey a message. (Paulus) drew from a variety of texts, and there were a number of texts that represented the major religions — Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Native American culture — with this common theme of loving one's neighbor. It felt like that was a message we needed to really convey at a time, like I said, that there was still finger-pointing as to who was to blame and blaming large groups of people. There were these attacks on the Muslim community as if they were to blame for this tragedy. We wanted to draw texts from all of these major religions with this common message of loving one's neighbor.

(True Concord debuted “Prayers and Remembrances” with the Tucson Symphony Orchestra at Centennial Hall on Sept. 11, 2011.)

"That was a pivotal moment, and the piece was a pivotal piece for us. Not that that was the intention. Again, the intention was to honor and mark this very sober and somber event. But the piece was very well received.

"The message was very powerful, so we wanted to record it, and we did record it two years later with Stephen here in Tucson. And unfortunately, it turned out that that was the last major project he ever did because six weeks later, after that recording, he had his tragic stroke from which he never recovered.

"We released ('“Far in the Heavens”) on the 14th anniversary of 9/11 while we were performing at Lincoln Center in New York City.

"I'd like to believe that (‘Prayers and Remembrances') still resonates. I certainly believe that it's still relevant. As a country, as a world, we learn from these tragedies, and we continue to learn from past tragedies and the tragedies that happen around us on what seems like a daily basis.

"But the message is still the same: it's loving one another despite our differences. We have way more in common than we have that is different, and that is our humanity, our need to love and support one another, and be respectful of everybody's traditions and backgrounds in this wonderful melting pot that we call America."