CODA
Year of composition: 2020
Instrumentation: flute, clarinet, harp, string quartet
Duration: 8′
Commissioned by Ensemble Paramirabo
Premiere: Ensemble Paramirabo
Le Gesù, Montreal
September 22, 2020
PROGRAMME NOTE
Originally conceived as a companion work to Ravel’s Introduction and Allegro, this piece took on a new contour with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic and the imposition of social distancing guidelines. I chose to embrace this physical separation as a basis for the work’s form by dividing the septet by instrumental type, with the string quartet arranged in a square enclosing a nucleus of flute, clarinet, and harp at the center. Coda can be heard as a series of miniature sonic capsules (not unlike Ravel’s work) that explore modes of interaction between the two instrumental groups: unity vs. alienation, participation vs. reaction, signal vs. noise, etc. The music is aphoristic and elegiac throughout – a reflection of my own coming to terms with what has been lost, and our collective feelings of uncertainty as we begin to reckon with a new, strange world.
Video link (starts at 1:05:27): https://vimeo.com/476768956/3894bf5f81