Bank St Arts, Sheffield, 25 March 2010
(Peter to the right of the picture at SoundSpacePlay, Leeds in a performance of La-la-la Walk, 2015.)

Weiss/Weisslich 20 (Peter Ablinger) premiere

As if in memory for flute and piano (2022)
As if in memory has been written for flautist Sophia Tegart and pianist Michael Sergow.
The piece ties together the memory of birds songs we heard more clearly during the inital lockdown
periods of the pandemic during 2020 and 2021. Hearing birdsong is a shared phenomenon, experienced
seperately for many during those intial stages.
Through this piece I bring together the aural landscape of the UK, focusing particularly on birds local
to where I live in Staffordshire, with the aural landscape of Washington state where Sophia Tegart is
based. I create an aural space where UK birdsong meets and interacts with US birdsong, something that
would not exist in the real world; a tapestry of the sounds we could hear whilst not being able to be in a
shared space.
The piece is divided into five main movements that are punctuated by short musical bookmarks,
returning to an unknown birdsong that I kept hearing throughout the pandemic and heard again whilst
writing this work on a Britten-Pears Creative Retreat near the Red House in Aldeburgh, Suffolk. This bird
song may be the same bird as one of the other birds I have represented and, perhaps, a keen-eared
birdsong expert will be able to help me identify this bird.
In each of the other movements a UK bird is paired with a US bird and a new aural space in which
they co-exist and interact is created, sometimes blurred by memory and othertimes more crystaline in the
representation of the birdsong and calls.
Bookmark I - U nknown Bird
I. A whisper in the branches - The Great tit and chipping sparrow
Bookmark II - U nknown Bird - as if in memory
II. As if in memory - The Blue tit and Yellow Warbler
Bookmark III - U nknown bird and Wood Powee
III. Cloudlight wings - The Goldfinch and Spotted Tawhee
Bookmark IV - The Robin - as if in memory ( U K and U S Robins)
IV . In the dusk of daybreak The Songthrush and Blackheaded Grosbeak
Bookmark V - U nknown bird and the Goldfinch
V . As one tilting across the sky - The Blackbird and Wood Poweee

As if in Memory for flute and piano – V. As one tilting across the sky – Blackbird and Wood Powee

"…They that sow in tears shall reap in joy: they that rap in joy shall soar in.." (Gregorian vamps for Lithuanian swamps)

World Premiere on 26 July, at the Sts. Johns' Church, in Vilnius, Lithuania. Performed by mixed choir "Brevis" (Lithuania), conducted by Gintautas Venislovas

Renald Deppe "…they that sow in tears shall reap in joy..", for mixed choir

realized by Jesse Greenberg, Lucie Vítková, Matt Lau, Ofir Klemperer, Teodora Stepancic, Douglas Farrand, & Assaf Gidron @ Spectrum NYC on January 19th 2019 at ~10:15PM. recorded by Matt Lau.

a harmony of many ears following the line, close to the ground or from a distance, barely hearing a vigorous buffeting of grasses and the laying of petals, one at a time, in the midst of it all.

a septet - January 2019

Aiming to encourage international cultural exchange and cooperation between the artists from different genres and countries, the Lithuanian Composers' Union initiated the International A.I.R. (Artist-In-Residence) Programme in 2011, with the financial support from the Lithuanian Ministry of Culture. In 2012 this programme adopted a new name DAR (Druskininkai Artists' Residence). Initially, the programme was designed to accommodate composers. Now it can also include interdisciplinary projects, involving collaborations with music performers (soloists and ensembles), professional artists working in other genres (fine arts, literature, theatre and dance), cultural managers, research scholars, etc. It aims at facilitating the challenging cooperations between artists interested in intercultural dialogue, exchange of ideas and unexpected fusions of different genres. We are also looking forward to collaborating with artists' residence programmes and institutions in other countries on a long-term basis.

Renald Deppe "…they that sow in tears shall reap in joy..", for mixed choir

DAR

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