towards clarity
for String Quartet
I —
II
Duration: 14:00
Program Notes
Around the time of writing this piece, I was obsessed with works that started with one mood and ended with the opposite. I had Schoenberg’s Verklärte Nacht and Bartók’s first string quartet on repeat—how beautiful that their music could start out so morose and dramatic and end so joyously, while coherently detailing the various emotional twists and turns involved in the transformation in between. Given that I was going through a rough patch in my life then, it made sense that these works spoke so much to me, and for me to create my own rendition of the concept when it came time to write this piece. The resulting first movement serves as a sort of reflection, while the second is a forward-looking piece painting the bumpy but ultimately better path ahead.
The first movement starts slowly with the theme played by a solo violin, and the other instruments join in one by one in a fugue-like fashion. This section, and the section that follows it, gives way to two more motifs: the expanding intervallic leaps and the triplet figure, the latter of which develops into a faster and more aggressive middle section. The movement then winds down and ends with one of the central motifs played by a solo violin.
The second movement serves as a contrast to the first; it starts with a warm chorale, cycles between several different sections, and ends boldly. These sections include: a chorale; a spirited, dance-like figure; a darker variation of the initial chorale melody; and a frenetic climax that combines a variation of the dance-like figure with one of the central motifs of the first movement.
My most heartfelt thanks to my mentor Allan Gilliland for his teachings and support during the writing period, and to Joanna Ciapka-Sangster, Neda Yamach, Leanne Maitland, and Ronda Metzies for breathing life into my music.
(2015-16)
Obsessions String Quartet:
Violin I: Joanna Ciapka-Sangster
Violin II: Neda Yamach
Viola: Leanne Maitland
Cello: Ronda Metzies