three rooms for chamber ensemble

room one
   -first wall
room two
   -second wall
room three (stuff, nonsense and all that jazz)
   -final wall

performed by the Freesound Ensemble June 2024
Tristan Durie, flutes
Anthony Thompson, clarinets
Aysel Taghi-Zada, violin
Matt Antal, viola,
Amahl Arulanandam, cello
Wesley Shen, piano
Kelly Lin, conductor

Firstly, I am not a composer. So, this piece is not coming as a step along some compositional or aesthetic development or voice, or from any sort of until now hidden compositional practice. It is rather a mostly new and singular experiment in trying to concretise, expand, and put down into notation the little sound games that run through my head (games I think many musicians play as well). This was done thanks to the very positive (and maybe a bit too optimistic) motivation of Paolo Griffin when I was joking about writing a piece to go along with Vortex Temporum, and much help from Ofer Pelz who helped guide me through the writing process.

I say piece, but this was mostly developed as disparate ideas that I found funny, that I turned into a number of independent miniatures, and that hopefully sound somewhat cohesive together (or maybe thankfully not). They mostly are made up of textural ideas that could continue on forever, or single sound objects that I wanted to repeat on end in only slightly different ways, possibly ad nauseum. I find a very enjoyable humour in the quiet little sparkles, the musical mumbling nonsense and the sad, pitiful little sounds, and the slightly obsessive approach to them. One will probably notice some clear inspiration and influence (or less generously, stealing) from composers I enjoy such as Berio, Donatoni and Sciarrino.

I was reluctant to give this piece a name as I did not have any particular inspiration or desire to enforce a particular image on the sounds. The only word that potentially acted as inspiration was ‘derpy’. Under pressure to give it one, I am happy with what it ended up being called. There is something fitting for me of ‘rooms’, especially an empty room, as both defined by the physical boundaries of walls as well as the space/emptiness/nothingness contained within. I like the idea of considering what could be in a room we see as empty; items, objects and sounds that we assume into the room and that become features of its emptiness/nothingness, versus the stuff that stands out as filling it. 

There is also something funny of the image of someone entering an empty room of an art gallery – perhaps by mistake –  and observing it and all the details of its blank walls with the same intent and intensity as the rest of the art.

three rooms

V.8 Protocol

All parts recorded on a spinet (sampled and performed on MIDI keyboard for out of range parts)

Le sacre du printemps: 2. Les augures claveciniers - Danses des sautereaux

Rite of Spring recorded all on a spinet (and samples used with a MIDI keyboard for notes out of range)

Le sacre du printemps Premier tableau: L'adoration du clavier - 1. Introduction

Le sacre du printemps: 3. Jeu de luth 4. Les rosaces printanières

Rite of spring recorded on a spinet (and samples on a MIDI keyboard for out-of-range notes)

Le sacre du printemps: 5. Jeux des registres couplés 6. Cortège de l'épinette 7. Danse du clavier

1. Introduction
2. Les augures claveciniers: Danses des sautereaux
3. Jeu de luth
4. Rosaces printanières
5. Jeux des registres couplés
6. Cortège de l'épinette
7. Danse du clavier

Rite of Spring all recorded on a spinet (and samples on a MIDI keyboard for notes out of range)

Sacre du printemps: Premier tableau - L'adoration du clavier

Anna Höstman- Lonesome Lake

performed at home (on my out of tune piano) with a Zoom H5 recorder.

V.8 Protocol

Wesley Shen

Related tracks