My second symphony, Urban Symphony, had its first public performance on April 11 by the Grove City College Symphony Orchestra! I composed this symphony last fall while on sabbatical from teaching at Grove City College, and was thrilled to have it premiered by our own orchestra. Directed by Dr. Jeffrey Tedford, the orchestra put in countless hours learning the music, and gave a fine rendition at its premiere.
From the program notes:
Urban Symphony is the second symphony by American composer Joseph Hasper, completed in 2024. This work expands upon Hasper’s ongoing exploration of the fusion between classical orchestration and contemporary electronic elements, integrating urban sonorities within a symphonic framework. Drawing inspiration from the rhythmic and harmonic textures of the city of Pittsburgh, PA, the symphony incorporates electronic drums, processed ambient sounds, and intricate orchestral writing to create a dynamic soundscape. Urban Sonata follows in the tradition of composers such as Mason Bates, John Adams, and Tan Dun, who have sought to bridge the gap between symphonic and electronic music. The work’s four movements—Graffiti Opus, Turnstile Blues, Adagio on 27th Street, and Urban Sonata—each capture a distinct aspect of city life, blending complex rhythmic structures, modal harmonic language, and innovative timbral combinations to reflect the energy, melancholy, and grandeur of the urban environment.
The first movement, Graffiti Opus, serves as an energetic and percussive introduction to the work. Harmonically, the movement is characterized by extended tertian chords and clusters, creating an angular yet vibrant harmonic landscape. The rhythmic material draws from asymmetrical meters and irregular accents, reflecting the spontaneity and unpredictability of street art. The integration of sampled urban sounds—such as aerosol spray cans, metallic clangs, and distant sirens—blurs the line between found sound and composed musical gesture. The movement’s form is through-composed, with recurring motivic fragments that evolve organically, mirroring the layered, overlapping nature of graffiti itself.
In Turnstile Blues, the orchestration takes on a mechanistic quality, evoking the rhythmic pulse of a city’s transit system. A steady ostinato in the lower strings, reinforced by electronic percussion, creates a relentless propulsion reminiscent of Steve Reich’s minimalist phasing techniques. The harmonic language here leans on modal inflections, particularly the mixolydian and dorian modes, giving the movement a blues-tinged color while maintaining a motoric energy. The brass section interjects with syncopated, quasi-improvisatory figures, resembling the spontaneous exchanges of a jazz ensemble. Through the use of electronic manipulation—filtered string harmonics, granular synthesis, and reverberant spatial effects—the movement captures the sonic atmosphere of subterranean spaces, evoking the hum and echo of subway tunnels.
The third movement, Adagio on 27th Street, presents a lyrical contrast, serving as the emotional core of the work. The orchestration here is sparse, featuring high strings in divisi, muted brass, and solo woodwind lines that intertwine with electronically processed textures. The harmonic progressions, based on pandiatonic clusters and suspensions, create an ethereal sense of suspended motion. Electronic ambient elements, including field recordings of distant traffic and city noise, are subtly interwoven into the fabric of the orchestra, functioning as an extension of the orchestral timbre rather than a separate entity. The movement’s melodic writing recalls Samuel Barber’s Adagio for Strings, yet its harmonic ambiguity and shifting textures evoke the cinematic orchestration of composers such as Thomas Newman.
The final movement, Urban Sonata, serves as a synthesis of the preceding ideas, structured as a modified sonata form. The principal theme, first introduced in Graffiti Opus, returns in a transformed state, its harmonic foundation expanded through polychordal layering and contrapuntal interplay. The electronic and orchestral elements reach their fullest integration, culminating in a coda that juxtaposes triumphant brass chorales against pulsing electronic rhythms. The movement, and indeed the work as a whole, celebrates the modern city as a living, breathing symphony—a place where classical tradition and contemporary innovation coexist in dynamic equilibrium.
Full performance on YouTube at https://youtu.be/ABjLkOXhs-I
