Adagio (for Rebecca)
for violin (2010)
Mayu Kuroda Cipriano, violin. Recorded 2020.
Duration: 5′
Premiere: Czech Music Camp for Youth, Horní Jelení, Czech Republic, 2016. Paul Sanho Kim, violin.
Kim wrote Adagio (for Rebecca) and dedicated it to his wife in 2010 while they were still dating. The piece is inspired by the polyphonic sonatas and partitas by Johann Sebastian Bach for solo violin—particularly the opening Adagio movement of his Sonata No. 1 in G Minor. In 2017, Kim incorporated it into an extended, eight-movement work for violin and cello called Where Darkness Meets Light, composed in collaboration with visual artist Hannah Kirkpatrick for an installation-based performance of the same name for the Chrysler Museum of Art’s Third Thursday with the Glass Studio performance series. Involving the projection of lights and shadows onto a screen using camera obscura techniques, the multimedia performance was a response to the recent death of Hannah’s father, who was an avid Bach listener.
Paul Sanho Kim 