Score for "The Sixth Floor" by Jesus Martinez

Exhibit Label: Originally from San Juan, Texas, in the part of the state known as “the Valley,” Jesus Martinez grew up in a musical family. He always wanted to be a drummer and was a member of the high school marching band. He attended his first orchestra concert in college and fell in love with orchestral music. Martinez describes himself as a programmatic composer: he finds a story that captivates him, that is something he feels he could invest his time in, and then creates music for it. He spoke Spanish first as a child, then English, but today he sees music as the universal language, the best way for him to tell stories. (Special exhibit, "Art Reframes History," on view on the Museum's seventh floor from September 9, 2020 through May 9, 2021) 

"The Sixth Floor" was written for a string quartet. The composition consists of 4 staffs of music in treble and bass clefs and was written for two violins, a viola, and a cello. "A Note On The Commission" and "About The Composer" are printed on the first page of the score. "Program Notes" are printed on the reverse of the first page of the score. "Performance Notes" are printed on the second page of the score. - Jan Masterson, Collections Cataloger

In a 2018 oral history with The Sixth Floor Museum, composer Jesus Martinez discussed how he initially approached this commissioned piece. He said, "I was thinking about it and doing a lot of research. I came to the thought that, well, you know, I'm thirty-one. Most of my generation knows a little bit about JFK obviously through school and their own research. But I wanted to recreate it. I wanted to recreate the assassination in a way." From the start, Martinez recognized that many of the people who would hear "The Sixth Floor" were not alive at the time of the assassination. He said, "What I would like young students or young children to take away from it is that, you know, music is very, very, very much an important part of our lives. It tells a story through a different outlet, through a different cue. And I think if the students can feel half of what I felt, I think that would be really, really important." -- Stephen Fagin, Curator