I recently read
Towards a New Poetics of Musical Influence by Kevin Korsyn. In this
article, he discusses the way in which Brahms took a phrase from a Chopin Berceuse and
composed a new work "around" that material (both melody and harmony). Korsyn
points out that this method of composition is very similar to the practices of 19th century poets.
Poets would often "borrow" a line from a pre-existing poem and use that line as the
nucleus of a new poem. Historically, music has "grown" in a very organic way (either through
conscious effort or unconscious ease). In other words, there has been a natural development
and expansion of music as it is passed down through generations. I decided to use this
method as a way to "grow" a new work from an older work.
I chose as my model Messiaen's Quatour Pour La Fin Du Temps. Given the choice of
instrumentation and my affinity for Quatour..., I took one of the principal interval cells
of Messiaen's piece, the pitch class set [015], and expanded the set to [01458]. I then manipulated
the intervallic content of the set to create the pitch series: G, D, G#, E, Bb, Eb, A B D F, (which is
not heard in its entirety until the end). I then divided the series (combined with an intuitively derived
rhythm) into two distinct motives that separate the work formally into three sections.
Stone Memories for Clarinet, Violin, Cello and Piano received its first performance by the University of Iowa's esteemed
Center for New Music under
the direction of David Gompper,
to whom the work is dedicated.
