Composer Scott Wheeler. Bruno Murialdo photograph
Live events ended abruptly for all performers. Composer Scott Wheeler was no different.
“I had a last concert in Los Alamos on March 9,” he says. Violinist Gil Shaham and pianist Akira Eguchi had been touring with Wheeler’s sonata “The Singing Turk,” and Wheeler was there. “We flew home through Dallas/Ft. Worth, and everybody was nervous. I thought it might be bad, but not permanent.
“Now I know it’s bad, but I still don’t think it’s permanent,” he says. “I don’t think any aspect is permanent. Online stuff is no substitute. There is already a tremendous hunger to get back. We’ll do it if we have to social distance, and do it different ways.”
Wheeler, longtime faculty at Emerson College, remains at home in North Reading. His New York apartment is currently donated to the chief medical officer at Bellevue Hospital, for emergency use during the overwhelming influx of patients.
Wheeler’s best-known compositions are theatrical. His opera “The Construction of Boston” premiered in 1990. Another opera, “Democracy: An American Comedy,” premiered at Washington National Opera in 2002. His flamboyantly staged “Naga” was part of a memorable trilogy of operas with White Snake Projects in 2016.
Of many smaller settings, notable is “The Granite Coast,” a piano trio commissioned for the opening of Rockport Music’s Shalin Liu Performance Center in 2010. He help found the new music ensemble Dinosaur Annex more than four decades ago, and has won awards and residencies too numerous to detail here.
Apart from Shaham, Wheeler has many soloist-proponents of his music—like Renée Fleming and Susanna Phillips—bringing his premieres across the globe. His earliest mentors seem to have traveled from a distant past of music: Virgil Thomson, Peter Maxwell Davies, Arthur Berger.
The composer/critic Kyle Gann wrote, “Wheeler’s music seems exactly like him: quiet, precise, cautious, articulate.” At this point, Wheeler’s expansive catalog makes its own network—poets, choreographers, dramatists, theater artists; the past, the moment.
This moment weighs heavily. “The whole situation of death and horror is so present,” Wheeler says. “I have to be one of the very fortunate ones, as a composer, for once.
“I’m watching with avidity, and concern,” he says. “Businesses of all kinds are in danger. Some of my favorite ensembles. What will be the impact at NEC, or Emerson? When music itself comes back, will people want to do it?
“People will lose livelihoods,” he says. “The smallest ensembles are capable of reconfiguring. The very large ones—the MFA, the BSO—they’ll be fine. In the middle, some institutions may not come through.”
As expected, Wheeler’s desk still remains full of projects. A trio to premiere at Brooklyn’s hot venue National Sawdust. Songs. A music theatre piece. Editing some of his own recorded work: songs to Paul Muldoon’s poetry; a set of cello/piano sonatas.
“I’m treating this like a residency,” he says. “We don’t know how long it will be. But just like any residency, I grab breakfast, get to work, grab lunch as a break and then we meet for dinner. It’s a lovely time.”
Wheeler keeps topical concerns—like this pandemic—apart from composing concerns.
“No doubt somebody is writing a ‘Coronavirus Symphony’ right now,” he says. “But that feels like the wrong kind of path. That belongs to ‘Saturday Night Live.’ It’s like a piece celebrating the moon landing. Those things fit pop culture better.
“Poets are always ahead of the game, aware of things,” he says. “Composing is the same way. We’re always dealing with the permanent topics, so it’s always news. We’re all writing things that are timely, if we’re in touch with what we are feeling.
“I write things as they have an opportunity to be performed,” he says. “I think part of a happy life in music is to be in touch with your performers. Do I think of the audience? No, I think of the performer; they think of the audience.
“It’s about collaborating with the right kind of people,” he says. “I write what works for that.”
Keith Powers covers music and the arts for Gannett New England, Opera News and Leonore Overture. Follow @PowersKeith; email to keithmichaelpowers@gmail.com.