40 minutes | String quartet and solo Tenor | 2014
An epic journey in sound, starting from simple premises, with melodic threads slowly unwinding unbroken over the course of 40 minutes. The piece is scored for amplified string quartet and solo tenor. The string lines build slowly then fade in and out of focus, creating a shimmering haze of harmony above which the tenor line floats. Fragments of text from Ovid’s Metamorphosis are delivered as if they were part of a distant news broadcast.
- The prem** Transmission Cycle, for Tenor and Strings: 40 mins, large-scale work for Jazz.ro
:EXPORT_FILE_NAME: TransmissionCycle
40 minutes | String quartet and solo Tenor | 2014
An epic journey in sound, starting from simple premises, with melodic threads slowly unwinding unbroken over the course of 40 minutes. The piece is scored for amplified string quartet and solo tenor. The string lines build slowly then fade in and out of focus, creating a shimmering haze of harmony above which the tenor line floats. Fragments of text from Ovid’s Metamorphosis are delivered as if they were part of a distant news broadcast.
The premiere was performed by The Romanian Quartet: Mihai Balabas, violin; Marina Pingulescu, violin; Maria Coltatu, viola; Corina Ciuplea, cello, with John Potter, Tenor.
“Along with the subtle sequencing of harmonies, the reflecting sound surfaces brought ebbing melodicism out in the generous space created by the recitative tenor line.. poignant” ADRIANA CARCU, All about Jazz review
Transmission Cycle, and an interview was broadcast on Romanian TV.
Transmission cycle was commissioned by the Jazz.ro supported festival Jazz in Church, Bucharest.
Structure and Design considerations
The piece represents the first large-scale work where I was specifically thinking about the effect the acoustic would have on the performance. Although this pre-dates pieces such as Architexture I for ten-part choir and Quantaform Series for solo flute which use measurement techniques to help bind the piece to the acoustic of the venue, Transmission Cycle leaves time and space for the acoustic to become a performer too, creating floating suspensions and drones whilst the musicians move on to other materials. Harmonically, the work also represented a pivotal moment: I was at this point testing my new thinking on Designing Music as a Surface where lines are sculpted out from larger blocks of material. During this work you can also hear the surroundings for these lines, as if they were silent actors in the performance through the gaps and spaces that are left behind. It’s a kind of acoustic subtractive synthesis in this case.