Larghetto Rubato (2010)

bassoon, cello, and guitar

Pascal Gallois, Rohan de Saram, and Magnus Andersson

Larghetto Rubato

Der Hunger von Spiegeln, for electric guitar, Yamaha DX7 and piano, percussion, contrabass, and video. In collaboration with the Ictus Ensemble. Premiered at the Lille Opera House on April 11, 2015.

Der Hunger von Spiegeln

In der Luft, da bleibt deine Wurzel (2011) 

for soprano and electronics

performed and recorded by Tony Arnold



Program note:


In der Luft, da bleibt deine Wurzel (2011) largely features, among a variety of other sound samples, recordings from a studio session with soprano Tony Arnold at Slee Studios. While working with her, I was able to notate surprisingly delicate and tiny details of vibrato and glissando shading. Her interpretation of these details, when reflected upon during the editing process, seemed to create a ripple effect throughout the other layers of the sonic atmosphere, and influence the entire musical language of the piece. 

The title is borrowed from the Paul Celan poem of the same name, from his 1963 Die Niemandsrose (The Nomansrose). The first stanza, below, is translated by Michael Hamburger:

In the air, that’s where your root remains, there, 
in the air.
Where the terrestrial rounds itself, clenched, earthly,
both breath and clay.

In der Luft, da bleibt deine Wurzel

Aur (Hebrew: אור, English: Light) (2011/2012)

for string quartet and electronics

performed and recorded by the JACK Quartet

Shindō no su (Japanese: 振動の巣, English: Nest of Vibration)

for flute, bass clarinet, glockenspiel, keyboard + laptop, violin, viola, and cello. 

Performed and recorded by the Talea Ensemble, conducted by Eduardo Leandro, viola solo by Elizabeth Weisser.



Program note:

In Vladimir Nabokov’s "Despair", the title of the book plays on the word’s connotations with dis-pair, as in to take apart a pair, since the protagonist’s insurance fraud scheme is based on the manipulated death of his doppelganger — the covert murder of his physical double. The resemblance between the two, however, is seen only by the protagonist himself, like a mirror onto which he projects his narcissism and vanity, a projection which drives him forward with his scheme toward an anxious and climactic final decoupling.

A self-image, splitting, recognizing a difference within itself, revolting against itself, is a common symbolic process — a character shatters a mirror in rebellion, tears up an old photograph, or burns their clothes in a fire. Shindō no su (nest of vibration) also stars a cast of characters that split from themselves, that are not sure if they are one or two, and that contemplate their shadow with nervous quivering, defiance, and confusion. Our protagonist, the viola, stars as if an anti-soloist in an anti-concerto, cautiously navigating the movements and vibrations of the ensemble like a spider across the threads of her web, herself a reflection of her own trembling terrain. This spider also carries her shadow while she roams, like an extra pair of antennae she seeks to abandon, augmenting the already overwhelming sensitivity she has toward the environment she creates.

The piece’s Japanese title nods to the mechanical houseplants that vibrate, nod, and flutter when spoken to, increasingly popular in the homes of Japan’s hikikomori.

Shindō no su

O Haupt voll Blut und Wunden
for ensemble   
commissioned and recorded by Ensemble SurPlus for their 20th anniversary concert at the E-Werk Freiburg, on December 8, 2012


An excerpt from the program note:

In O Haupt voll Blut und Wunden, written for and dedicated to Ensemble SurPlus on their 20th anniversary, the players are given performance directions and interpretation strategies to work through five J.S. Bach chorales. Each player navigates through one of the four individual Soprano, Alto, Tenor, or Bass contrapuntal lines of the chorales, and each of their lines have been augmented, distorted, expanded, and given indications to extend expressivity through a wide variety of performance techniques – all while the players read from the same four-voice SATB Bach chorale.

To further intensify and complicate matters, there is no conductor, and each player is given a flexible, uncoordinated tempo to work through, only occasionally taking cues from the pianist or violinist. In this way, the antiquated Baroque rhythmic grid of the Bach chorales has been rendered fluid and unpredictable, with each contrapuntal voice rising and falling as waves of interpretive virility and spontaneity flow through each of them; transforming them into liquid, as if cast over water.

RPhillips

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