Output details

Fast Medium Swing

Research content/process:

9 minute work for five performers: piano, three melodic instruments and sampler keyboard. First performance in the Cutting Edge series (London) by Plus Minus Ensemble, with sixteen further performances by six ensembles in Belgium, The Netherlands, USA and the UK. Fast Medium Swing explores compositional strategies for dealing with both a limited amount of material and almost no allowance for development of that material. The quintet is divided into 3 subgroups - (1) piano solo, (2) melodic trio, and (3) sampler keyboard - each of which has five short sound-events/samples that are all less then a second in duration. One strategy was to create patterned chains of these short ideas to create larger structural units. In some instances the three subgroups present the same patterns, and in others each instrument has their own pattern with its own length, which when all repeated creates polyrhythmic relationships. Another strategy was to shift the relationships between the members of the three sets (e.g. piano sound-event 1 coupled with trio sound-event 1, then recoupled with trio sound-event 2). The only transformative ‘treatments’ applied to the material is transposition (always parallel) of the sound-events and there is one moment when one of the trio’s sound-events is slowed down to one-sixteenth of the speed, which gives that material a very different associative quality. The work also explores the incorporation of two ‘open elements’. Firstly, any melodic instrument may be used for the three melodic parts, which has the potential to radically change the sonic and associative quality of the work. Secondly, the group selects their own samples. The only stipulation is that the five samples are all topically related (e.g. all animal sounds), which again has the potential to affect the character and meaning of the work.