composers

Andrew Thomas

Elegy for ten players

My piece is a response to Tchaikovsky’s fifth symphony, particularly its second movement, a work I have been haunted by for some years. Composing the present piece has been a way of coming to terms with the symphony and also putting it behind me.

From the outset I had no intention to recreate the symphonic scale of Tchaikovsky’s work so I opted for an ensemble of ten players which is almost identical to those used in the fifth’s second movement (I have employed solo players, excluding the bassoon and heavy brass and adding a piano). The melodic, contrapuntal and harmonic roles of the individual instruments are very significant to my understanding of the piece and, hence in these respects I have kept as close to Tchaikovsky as I could. For example, both the Tchaikovsky and my piece start with sustained string writing which is joined by a horn solo and later a contrapuntal line from the clarinet. This continues quite strictly but I was very conscious not to let this become routine. I have shaped melodies and harmonies with the aim of instrumental groupings and roles seeming as natural and developmental as in the Tchaikovsky.

The main source of inspiration from the Tchaikovsky arises in my pitch and rhythmic material. Rhythmically, everything is derived or at least strongly related to the dotted crotchet semi-quaver semi-quaver rhythm that is so integral in the fifth symphony, sometimes violent and ugly, sometimes questioning and intimate. In my piece the rhythm, or variations and retrogrades upon it, is constantly appearing in ways that vary and mask its meaning.

The pitch material in my piece is built from the first six different pitches of the horn solo in Tchaikovsky’s second movement: D, C#, B, A, E, F#. I used a hexachordal rotation technique to build six chords that became the basis of my work. The opening section from rehearsal figures A to E is an attempt to develop an idea of stasis. Whilst there is obviously a great deal of rhythmic movement, the pitch material very rarely strays from one chord and motivic development revolves around a falling minor third and a rising tone; this third is from Tchaikovsky’s horn solo (D – B) and is a variation upon the opening three notes of this solo (D, C#, B becomes D, B, C#). The accompaniment from the strings is intended to create an underlying sense of stasis in relation to the melodic activity and an eventual mediation to the running, percussive piano writing.

The material from rehearsal figure E travels through a number of transpositions and sways in mood from emotional sentimentality to darkness as it develops towards a chaotic and long climax at figure J. I wanted the climax to be a world away from the lyricism and beauty of sound that has preceded it. The motif is openly re-born in a screeching clarinet line backed up by a high horn. Again, this climax is an experiment with a static sound world that evolves as the material slows down. When this happens the listener’s ears will be drawn with increasing detail to the motifs and melodies. The oboe at figure K is a literal repeat of figure E that stands out and forcefully draws the listener’s attention from the closing moments of the climax.

The ending of the work is intentionally ambiguous. The harmony implied is the minor third, rising tone motif in the transposition of F#, D#, F. As the music approaches figure L I have attempted to dissipate the effect of the interval by removing the horn theme, which concludes the earlier statement at figure E, and instead allowing the oboe, piano, cello and double bass to fade to nothing over a long period. As this happens the motifs natural resolution (F natural) is slowly introduced in octaves by the viola and second violin. This F creates a simple stasis through which ghosts of the dotted crotchet semi-quaver semi-quaver theme appear almost unnoticed.
The work is an Elegy to a private personal relationship; Tchaikovsky’s fifth symphony was ‘our song’.

© Andrew Thomas

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