WPR Music new album of the week: Kip Winger’s ‘Symphony of the Returning Light’

Contemporary American composer Kip Winger recently released a recording with a symphony —his first — entitled “Symphony of the Returning Light,” and a violin concerto — also his first — subtitled “In the Language of Flowers.” The music synthesizes modern classical compositional techniques with his own unique language of the heart in a deeply skillful and appealing way.

Winger’s new album is out on the Naxos label, featuring performances by the Nashville Symphony Orchestra conducted by Giancarlo Guerrero with violinist Peter Otto. The NSO commissioned both works with Guerrero, their longtime music director, suggesting Winger write a symphony. The idea took root.

Winger joined me from Europe for an interview via Zoom; he currently splits his time between Europe and Nashville.

Winger is certainly a very successful songwriter and rock musician: He is the founder, bassist and frontman for his eponymous band Winger, whose albums reached platinum status in the late 1980s and early 1990s. 

Winger is also a master craftsman in the classical realm. His ballet, “Conversations with Nijinsky,” was nominated for a 2017 Grammy for Best Contemporary Classical Composition and rose to No. 1 on the Billboard traditional classical chart. His sensibility as a contemporary composer has been honed over decades studying with some of the leading composers and pedagogues of the day: Richard Danielpour, Michael Kurek and Steven Mackey among them.

As for the process of creating his first symphony, “I was going through a very difficult time when I started writing it, and I felt quite lost from myself,” Winger admitted. 

He recounted something of a mystical experience: “You’re searching, searching, searching — all this introspection. I felt like I was being contacted by something, I don’t know what, and I thought, what if your own lost soul was trying to reach you? . . . What if a person receives morse code messages of atonement from his own soul?”

The idea became the framework for the symphony, both in structure and in emotional content. He selected four conceptual titles, one for each movement: S.O.S, Eleos (mercy), Metamorphosis and Metanoia (deep transformation.) Using the rhythms of the corresponding morse code, Winger deftly cycles the themes through the orchestra in many different guises.

Another structural element in the symphony is the “brick wall chord” placed in each movement. 

“It’s a very dissonant chord depending on how you voice it throughout the orchestra, and the idea is that the protagonist of the story keeps coming up against the brick wall chord and is not able to break through to enlightenment,” Winger said. “Finally, in the 186^th bar of the piece, he breaks through, and I use this giant major chord with some major seconds.” 

It’s a rich and satisfying conclusion to an intensive journey from crisis to transformation. 

The other work on the album is a substantial violin concerto subtitled “In the Language of Flowers,” performed spectacularly by the German-born soloist Peter Otto, who’s now based in the U.S. and is currently the concertmaster of the NSO.

I asked Winger if he’d had exposure to classical strings or had studied the acoustic version of his primary instrument as a young person. He said his parents played in a jazz trio, so he fiddled around on a variety of instruments. 

But in terms of writing for a virtuoso performer, Winger already possessed a certain comfort level.

“I’ve worked with [Winger lead guitarist] Reb Beach my whole life, and Reb’s a virtuoso electric guitar player. He’s a freak of nature,” Winger said. 

Winger collaborated with Beach on some of the dazzling solos that have transfixed audiences around the world. So, in thinking about writing for a violinist, “I’m going to do what I’ve been doing, going to really put that voice out there and do some shredding,” he said. “And Peter was up for it. I learned a lot from Peter.”

Otto’s performance displays power and authority while also providing a sense of warmth and radiance. The concerto is brimming with solo cadenzas — they provide something of a throughline for the piece, and Otto plays brilliantly, with lightning-fast execution, a deliciously delicate touch, and a terrific sense of storytelling. 

“He really worked hard at that piece, and I thank him so much for that. He represented it so well,” praised Winger. 

And there’s Otto’s intonation. Perfect, as Winger pointed out, specifically mentioning a passage at the very end of the concerto’s third movement, where the soloist gently ascends into a heavenly stratosphere.

Like the symphony, the concerto also has a narrative arc.

“I wanted to write about the relationship I was in; the excitement of falling in love,” said Winger. 

He described going to a small park in Nashville with flower beds and wondering about the life of the flowers. He delved into floriography — the language and emotional meaning attributed to flowers. The violin concerto coalesces around that concept. It’s structured in four movements, each named for a flower: “Forsythia,” “Viscaria,” “Ambrosia” and “Wisteria.” The music expresses their characteristics that which correspond to a journey through a deep and meaningful romantic relationship.

The piece came into being with a melody that became the basis for the third movement. 

“The melody was way better than I was. I was so afraid of that melody,” said Winger. “There’s no music that I’ve ever written that brings my soul forth as much as that third movement . . . It was a magical experience.” 

The movement, “Ambrosia,” depicts deep, reciprocal love.

The first movement, “Forsythia,” was appended after Winger had completed the other three. His mentor, Richard Danielpour, recommended a fourth movement, and Winger went back to music he’d worked on but had jettisoned, finding it was ideal to express the excitement of new beginnings. 

The violin is flirty and seductive in the second movement, “Viscaria,” which is the symbol for attraction and invitation. 

“This is like a tango, but not. I was hearing Piazzolla,” Winger said.

The finale, “Wisteria,” expresses devotion, depth, trust and longevity. 

“I was able to write that movement better than the other ones,” he said. “I was on top of it. I heard it very clearly, which kind of plays into the stability and devotion.” 

Winger also talked about purposefully giving his violin concerto a big ending, recapitulating the themes and bestowing a powerful final statement on both the violin and the orchestra.

The orchestra is just great, and Winger has provided lots of opportunities for each section, and players within the sections, to shine under Guerrero’s baton. There is a lot of attention to detail on the recording itself, and the balance between the violinist and the orchestra is ideal. Winger has given the violin an enormous range of emotion, all captured with every nuance on the recording. 

And he made a point to mention the Grammy-winning producer on the album, Tim Handley, and how grateful he was to work with him: “I just love the way he made this sound.”

Both compositions were inspired, fed and nurtured by Winger’s emotional life. 

“I’m very drawn to music where I feel the pain. I need the emotional connection; to feel the human condition enough to draw me into it,” he said. “And that’s how I compose, and that will always be where I’m coming from.”

Winger is a kindred spirit to many of the Romantic and post-Romantic classical composers in that way. His music reflects an undeniable understanding and experience of the human condition from the depths to the heights. Winger is utterly in his element as a contemporary classical composer when he shares that experience through the medium of orchestral music.