For this piece, I imagined a gigantic piano, like a piano in dream world, though the pianist does not have to be gigantic, but just able to play the instrument! To create this, I divided the ensemble into two parts. One group contains the piano, violin and viola, the other the wind trio. The violin and viola play with a plectrum (like pizzicato, but making a harder sound) when they play with piano. So this group is the super-piano, the percussive part, the part which is "actually" played. Often, the piano holds a specific "silent chord" which resonates. Usually the resonance of the piano dies away, but I imagine it floating and then developing. I chose particular multiphonics to be played by the woodwind instruments that should support the resonance from the piano, which then make this imagined development. Also rather than just hold a note or a chord, I wanted some action inside this. Therefore the harmony slowly shifts without using trills. A melody grows from this texture. The silently held chords in the piano part (the chord resonators) are strongly related to the pitches of the multiphonics, and the percussive part in the piano, violin and the viola is an expansion of the multiphonics chords. I imagine the sound to be "circulating" a little above the piano.
Dai Fujikura (edited by Harry Ross) |