performed by The State Chamber Orchestra Sinfonietta Rīga and conductor Normunds Šnē

Grand Concert of Latvian Symphonic Music
January 29, 2022
Great Guild, Riga

Ray-bows II

perf. by Rūta & Zbignevas Ibelhauptas Piano Duo (LT)
Commissioned by the “Warsaw Autumn” foundation

A slow metamorphosis of silence of the falling snow. Alongside it is a metamorphosis of touching the piano; a study of the touches that vibrate the pianos and turn them into long sounding, resonating objects. Thus you realize that the piano keys are like certain magic buttons by which resonating abysses of the piano can be raised. If you succeed in pressing them right, you may hear at least some music of those resonating abysses, meanwhile the sounds of the key attacks are just little iceberg peaks sticking out on the surface.

Desktop

"Silence of the falling Snow" for 2 pianos (2003)

perf. by London sinfonietta, cond. Jack Sheen. 2nd of December 2022, Queen Elizabeth Hall, Southbank center, London (UK)

"To dream is to forget.." - Fernando Pessoa. The Book of Disquiet

"I’ve been living with the minor second all my life and I finally found a way to handle it…" Morton Feldman, 1982

Co-commissioned by and written for Ensemble Modern, London Sinfonietta and Remix Ensemble

Cyclically floating between different phases of density and intensity, minor and major, slowing or accelerating waves, the piece is woven from hypnotically repetitive patterns of 7 slightly different tempos which intertwine through 16 lines of the ensemble conceived as a complex human body with regular breathing, heart beating, eye movements, blood flow etc., all happening at the same time but not synchronised.

The title “Sleeping Patterns” refers to the brain wave oscillations through different sleep stages as well as to the Morton Feldman’s question “Why Patterns?”

Duration: 20’

Instrumentation: fl, ob, cl, bsn, tpt, hn, tbn, acc, kbd, 2 vibr, 2 vln, vla, vc, cb

© Éditions Salabert/Universal Music Publishing Classical

"Sleeping patterns" for ensemble (2022), London sinfonietta (excerpt)

perf. by Talvi Nurgamaa (Ensemble for New Music Tallinn)

"Psalms" for viola d'amore (2008, vers. 2023)

commissioned by Ircam-Centre Pompidou and SWR for the 100 years anniversary of György Ligeti

1st performance: ManiFeste (Philharmonie de Paris), 19th June 2023, SWR Vokalensemble, cond. Yuval Weinberg, electronics IRCAM: Robin Meier

Duration: 18'

"then white light / no longer disguised as matter". Louise Glück, End of Summer

“Iridescence” for choir and electronics (2023) is a search for a musical metaphor of light - a radiating sound object, a choir emanating light, inspired by “Lux aeterna” by György Ligeti, one of my lighthouse composers. The title comes from the interviews with Ligeti who used this term to describe sound surfaces of changing colours in terms of harmony and timbre which appeared immediately as a perfect concept to my composition referring to the optic, light-based phenomenon of iridescence in nature.

The voices of the choir are constantly moving in a circle from the highest frequencies down to the lowest pitches and returning, gradually expanding the micro-polyphonic sphere, densifying, enriching, transforming it towards its utmost limits. The only form of sound in the piece is a pure wave, like a simple breath in and out which becomes slower and longer along the organic evolution of the entire sound body. The only text material used, pronounced without consonants and therefore accessible only for the singers, is a phrase from Richard Brautigan's poetry “Star Hole” (“I sit here on the end of a star”) which, like a mantra, is repeated infinite times adding a melancholic, nostalgic, lightly apocalyptic dimension to the lux aeterna theme:

I sit here
on the perfect end
of a star,
watching light
pour itself toward
     me.

 

The light pours
itself through
a small hole
in the sky.

I'm not very happy,
but I can see
how things are
     faraway.

Richard Brautigan


Justė Janulytė © Éditions Salabert/Universal Music Publishing Classical

"Iridescence" (2023) for choir and live electronics (Robin Meier, IRCAM), excerpt

For viola da gamba & bass continuo
By Eva Reiter & Tom Pauwels 
Rehearsal Recording in Vienna (nov 22)

Prelude in A-minor (du 4ième Livre) by Marin Marais

live recording from Pirelli Hangar Bicocca, Milano Musica festival, 5 May 2023. Perf. by Cibele, Dianthus, Eridàno and Kandinsky string quartets

Commissioned by the Fondazione I Teatri di Reggio Emilia / Casa del Quartetto for the S. Prospero Square, Reggio Emilia (IT), dedicated to Francesco Filidei

"Je touchais à la nuit pure.." (P. Valery)

The piece “Circle for a Square” with a title based on a word game of geometric figures, was written to be premiered in a square where the sound of string quartets is constantly moving in a circle, gradually expanding the sphere in a sense of range, texture and dynamics.

"Circle for a Square" for 4 string quartets (2018)

Juste Janulyte, Unanime, long version for 8 trumpets
The Monochrome Project, live @ festival Romanische Sommer, Cologne 6th June 2021
Marco Blaauw, Christine Chapman, Mathilde Conley, Rike Huy, Bob Koertshuis, Nathan Plante, Markus Schwind, Laura Vukobratović

Juste Janulyte, Unanime, The Monochrome Project

Latvian Radio Choir Chamber Singers, cond. Kaspars Putniņš

Words: 'Square Poem' by Lewis Carroll

Art: Dante Gabriel Rossetti

Plane Chants (2025)

dedicated to Henri Demarquette

performed by Henri Demarquette and Sequenza 9.3., cond. Catherine Simonpietri

Plonge tes yeux dans les yeux fixes / Des Satyresses our des Nixes                            Charles Baudelaire (L'Avertisseur, Fleurs du Mal)

1st performance: 3rd of June, 2015, Philharmonie de Paris                                       

"Plonge" (eng. "Plunge") for cello and 12 voices (2015) was commissioned by Henri Demarquette and the vocal Ensemble Sequenza 9.3  for their programme "Vocello" and premiered at a special concert at the Philharmonie de Paris on the 3rd of June.
As my previous pieces were mostly written for strings (especially cello) and voices, usually in "monochrome" ensembles, I was really curious to mix, fuse these timbres together in a very homogeneous texture, revealing the "cantabile" quality of both and exploring very different colours of different ranges of the cello which may correspond to different timbres of the choir.
When I discovered "Vocello" repertoire, I got completely taken by Dido's Lament by Henry Purcell the musicians included into their programme, which is based on a continuously descending basso continuo. In terms of baroque rethorics this figure is called catabasis, a musical symbol of the descent to the underworld. Then by a pure accident my attention had been captured by a related ecxerpt from Charles Baudelaire's poetry, creating a mystic vision of sinking into a state of stasis (Plonge tes yeux dans les yeux fixes / Des Satyresses our des Nixes from L'Avertisseur, Fleurs du Mal). So my piece is an acoustic metaphor of all these inspirations together. The musical process is an extremely gradual catabasis although with a "happier end", rather bringing to an ecstatic, hypnotic state unlike the tragic Purcell's final. The musical structure of the piece could remind of a whirling vortex that is gradually getting more and more slow, wide, profound until the cellist gets drowned and melted in the sea of voices which accumulate like increasing resonances of the cello line... Through this slowing vortex the connection between the musical time sensation and space is also being explored: the more the acoustic space is filled in with sounds, the more their spectrum becomes wider and richer, the more the time gets slow until completely freezes. Juste Janulyte

"Plonge" for cello and 12 voices (2015)

The works of Justė Janulytė claim to build a "monochrome music" collection: they explore time-space perception through large-scale multilayered textures and extremely gradual metamorphoses. Justė Janulytė's catalogue, balancing between the aesthetics of minimalism, spectralism and acoustic electronica, has become one of the most fascinating focal points in the contemporary musical world. (Universal Music Publishing Classical) 

More on www.justejanulyte.com