String Quartet (Score)
SKU: HL.14023668
Composed by Michael
Nyman. Music Sales
America. Classical.
Score. Composed 1993. 22
pages. Chester Music
#CH60865. Published by
Chester Music
(HL.14023668).
ISBN
9780711932975.
9.0x12.0x0.095
inches.
String
Quartet No.3 was written
for, and first performed
by the Balanescu Quartet,
February 1990 at the
Queen Elizabeth Hall,
London. Duration 16
minutes. Instrumental
parts are available on
sale. Quoting composer:
In the summer of 1989 I
composed a choral work,
Out of the Ruins, for
Agnieszka Piotrowska's
BBC2 documentary which
dealt with the physical
and emotional responses
of some inhabitants of
Leninakhan to the
earthquake which
devastated Armenia the
previous December. When
he heard the recording of
the work that I made with
the Holy Echmiadzin
Chorus under the fervent
conducting of Khoren
Meykhanejian, Alex
Balanescu suggested
turning Out of the Ruins
into a string quartet.
There seemed no reason or
opportunity to do this
until I felt the need to
add to the intensity of
my experiences in Armenia
the no less profound
experience of witnessing
the images of the
Romanian revolution on
television during the
later part of December
1989. The compositional
procedure was as follows:
to take Out of the Ruins
as a template on which
the Romanian vocal or
instrumental music would
be superimposed, quite
often stretched into new
intervallic shapes though
the demands of the
completely performed
harmonic structure.