String Quartet
SKU:
HL.49047454
Score
and Parts. Composed
by Julian Anderson.
String Ensemble. Chamber,
Classical. Softcover. 148
pages. Duration 1380
seconds. Schott Music
#ED13989. Published by
Schott Music
(HL.49047454).
UPC:
842819101086.
9.0x12.0x0.358
inches.
My 3rd
String Quartet is in six
contrasted movements.
Certain musical figures
recur across the work,
but there are few themes
as such. The main
emphasis is on contrast
of mood, texture,
harmony, pacing and
timing. Unlike many of my
works this quartet had no
extra-musical
inspiration, and in
principle should have no
subtitle. Certain
features already present
in my music became more
prominent in this new
work: modes (limited
collections of pitches)
have always helped me to
focus musical character,
but here a sense of key
note for each mode became
much more pronounced, as
did the difference
between modes for each
section of the work. A
sort of hybrid key-system
emerged (even with
equivalents of major and
minor) which is not
normal tonality, nor does
it aim to imitate it.
Unlike tonality this
key-system includes
noises, extended
performance techniques
and intervals outside
Western tuning as
available resources. What
I hope it does is to
focus the listening
experience onto different
musical areas, to
encourage a sense of both
modulation from one area
to another and to give
the music a sense of
goal. No conscious
knowledge of this is
needed when listening:
the music should
communicate directly on
its own. Here, then, is
this collection of six
musical colours, related
and unrelated, different
yet belonging together,
variable yet in a set
order. Hence the
subtitle, chosen both for
both its sound and its
sense: 'hana no hanataba'
meaning, in Japanese,
'bouquet of flowers'. A
brief description: 1)
Moderately fast. Short
droplets of sounds gather
increasing momentum. 2)
Very fast. Canons and
bells at different
speeds. 3) Very slow -
fast - very slow - very
fast - very slow. The
main slow movement and
its main scherzo. An
emphasis on non-tempered
tunings and on inhaling
and exhaling waves of
sound. The slow sections
feature florid melodic
writing. In the exuberant
scherzo competing duos
and trios create
imaginary folk music. 4)
Extremely fast/extremely
slow. Open strings and
harmonics fuse into a
single string instrument
- like a sort of large
resonating Medieval
tromba marina. 5) Very
fast. A variation on
movement 2). Variation,
Schoenberg told Cage, is
just a sort of repetition
'with some things changed
and others not.' 6) Slow
- Very Fast - Fast -
Slow. The opening calm
harmonies and florid
melodies evoke movement
3) in different music.
The fast part features
one overt theme: a
fanfare-like call to
attention which is
subject to extensive
development. There is
much use of non-Western
tuning. At its climax the
music freezes into a
frieze - a wall of sound
standing in front of the
audience with increasing
obstinacy and certainty
as the work grinds
towards its cadence.
Cadence No. 6
