Display a 22k gif file of a page of the manuscript of this piece.

This piece, composed in 1985, is a large-scale piece for a small-scale instrument. Its four movements recall the mandolin tunes of the composer's father and grandfather, conveying something of the experience of the Eastern European immigrants as they discovered America.

The piece opens with Arrival, a first glimpse of the tip of the Statue of Liberty, growing into a complex combination of exhilaration, fear, liberation and regret. Ghosts from the Old Country is from the realm of memory, with past voices and places emerging from the night. In Progress or Poverty?, fast-paced city life assaults the senses, reeling like the sped-up scenes from early silent movies, as the economic reality of the "gold-paved" streets hits home. The final movement, Who Are My People?, is a meditation on who we are and where we came from, based on echoes of the preceding movements.

This piece is published by Plucked String Editions and was commissioned by William Walach for "Mandolin Celebration II", with support from the Evelyn W. Preston Memorial Fund and the George A. Long and Grace L. Long Foundation. Each movement uses a different mandolin tuning:

I: E/G-D-A-E,
II: G-C/D-G/A-E,
III: G-C#/D-G/#A-D#/E (later, quarter-tones),
IV: G-D-A-E.