Format : Sheet music
Fragment I-IV was composed between 1959 and 1961. I premiered the piece myself on February 12 1962 at a concert where Fragment V for violin and piano and Fragment VI for six orchestra groups were also performed. The four piano pieces contain the first audible results of my preoccupation with the fractal “infinity series” discovered in 1959. “Fractal” designates the property of for example visual form patterns that appear in a process of infinite “microscoping” where the figures reappear for the spectator in constantly enlarged segments of the original fractal form. In much the same way thescore-reader as well as the listener can follow how in for example Fragment III the six notes of the first measure reappear in a much slower figure an octave lower in the left hand (that only manages to get through these six notes in the course of the entire movement) analogous to the zooming-in on a visual fractal form. Each Fragment has its own defining appearance: Fragment I consists of two staccato melodies (with built-in rests) that are tied to a distinct third melody. Fragment II stammers and stutters its way through various shorter note values that are almost identical to boot (for instance they include isolated triplet notes that come immediately before or after notes of another equally short duration). Great demands are thus made on the pianist’s scrupulous attention to the details of this fine-grained universe of rhythms! Of the four pieces Fragment III offers the most directly accessible demonstration of this composition technique – as mentioned above its opening measure fractally projects itself six times as slowly and an octave lower in the left hand through the rest of the movement. Fragment IV is a kind of shadow that reproduces – in a vague “dreaming” manner – all the melodic notes from Fragment III but
SKU: HL.14041307
ISBN 9788759819333. 10.25x14.5x0.052 inches.
Waterways (Vandveje) - Three Pieces for Piano by Per Nørgård (2008-09).
Written for Anne Marie Fjord Abildskov.
Preface / Programme NoteThe three small piano pieces collectively called WATERWAYS was composed in 2008-2009 for Anne Marie Fjord Abildskov and they are dedicated to her.You will hear traces of earlier piano works of mine – GROOVING from 1968 and ACHILLEUS AND THE TORTOISE from 1983 – in these new pieces.
The first movement is characterized by echo-like sounds, which also appear in GROOVING. Semitones are overlayered and soundsimultaniously, and then they are muted one by one to give a reminiscence of the initial sound. In this new movement an extra echo is added, like an extra skim of the stoneacross the water surface – three skims, actually.
In the second movement you may hear traces of ACHILLEUS AND THE TORTOISE. The left and right hand both play arpeggio-like scale patterns. The music is shimmering, like a moiré on a water surface, with constantly changing, very short durations.In the third movement the pattern of irregular durations is maintained and expanded, but only in fragments – and you may catch a glimpse of a new melody emerging.
Per Nørgård
