By David Sanford | For Solo Cello | 7′

Title: Seventh Avenue Kaddish
Composer: David Sanford
Year Composed: 2001
Instrumentation: For Solo Cello
Duration: 7′
Format: Full Score
Page Size: Letter
Catalog Number: OM0302

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Written for Matt Haimovitz’s Anthem album after the tragedies of 9/11, David Sanford’s Seventh Avenue Kaddish places the cellist near ground zero, playing on the streets of New York as buildings collapse, debris blinds, dust suffocates. Yet the street musician continues to wail because that is all he can do. The form of “Seventh Avenue Kaddish” is inspired by the four parts of John Coltrane’s A Love Supreme – “Acknowledgement,” “Resolution,” “Pursuance,” “Psalm.”

In Sanford’s words: “Seventh Avenue Kaddish was written to express simultaneously the point of view of a cantor, a jazz visionary, a street musician, and/or a concert cellist. They share the perhaps incorrect sense that their only tenable position in the face of catastrophic events is to soldier on as entertainers and/or professional mourners.”

Commission/Dedication: To Matt Haimovitz.
Premiere: First performed October 11, 2022, at CBGB in New York, NY by Matt Haimovitz.
Recording: This work is recorded on Oxingale Records’ album Anthem and Live at the Knitting Factory, and PENTATONE Oxingale Series’ Orbit and Cello JAZZ, all recordings performed by Matt Haimovitz.