Six volumes of six Impromptus each, for piano two hands
work in progress
An »impromptu« originally referred to a witty bon mot made up on the spot during a conversation. By the time of Schubert and Chopin, an »impromptu« also came to designate a particular type of Romantic piano music, that is, a piece usually in ternary form. However, the usage of this term within a musical context predates Schubert: it was first used either by the Bohemian piano virtuoso Jan Václav Voříšek (known in Vienna as Worzischek), who had already written impromptus five years before Schubert did, or by Schubert's publisher Tobias Haslinger. Later composers such as Smetana, Liszt and Scriabin, also called some of their shorter piano works impromptus, and sometimes added to that title a second descriptive word (Liszt: Valse-Impromptu; Skrjabin: Impromptu à la Mazur). Robert Schumann's Impromptus op. 5 on a theme by Clara Wieck, however, are actually variations.
I was searching for a title for a new collection of piano pieces in which I wanted to try out very specific intervallic and chordal relationships in a rather spontaneous and less formal manner. While looking through the piano literature of the 19th century, I came across the impromptu. In preparation for my work Time Recycling op. 22n, I had written the 5x5 Short Intermezzos op. 22j; likewise, the Impromptus should now show me the way to my next larger-scale work for chorus and orchestra.
In contrast to the short Intermezzos, this time I conceived a more extensive cycle of piano music. So while the Intermezzos were between 30 seconds and two-and-a-half minutes long (the entire cycle lasted approximately 35 minutes), the Impromptus would be 2 to 8 minutes long, and this time there would also be 6 times 6, in other words a total of 36 pieces. A diary (journal) of Impromptus in 6 volumes matured from an abstract idea to the beginning of the compositional process during the first quarter of 2020.
Each of the pieces is based on the development of a complex harmonic process, which consists of six variants of two series of five-voice chords. These are obtained by means of permutation from combining four times six (i.e. a total of 24) chords and their 24 possible combinations. The material is thus predetermined, but the form develops freely from improvisation or from playing freely with the material. The individual parts emerge almost intuitively from the harmonies, and impart to each of the impromptus an individual shape. The repeatability of individual structures is limited to the individual parts, while formal elements are not repeated. At best, analogies result in vague similarities between formal elements.
PREMIÉR CAHIER
[First volume]
Duration: approx. 32 minutes
I Pensées errantes dans le matin (duration: 8'15'')
»dédié à mon ami et grand interprète de mes œuvres Johannes Piirto«
Composed 2020, final fair copy 16.4.2022
The first two pieces of the first volume display an ambivalence between strong relationships within a part and a loose and constantly exploratory overall structure. The tripartite form of the first impromptu is articulated by the three basic tempo indications (I Modéré, II Mysterieux und III Vivant), which also underline the episodic nature of the piece.
With a duration of over eight minutes, the first Impromptu clearly exceeds the original temporal conception; this can be traced back to the complex development, which requires considerably more space for compositional elaboration. The piece ends on a ninth chord in close position, which is reached via a very idiosyncratic voice leading: the melody line descends chromatically from G to F (i.e. G, F sharp, F), while the bass line states a permutation of an augmented triad consisting of the notes E flat – B – G.
II Désir éternel (duration: 7'08'')
»à la memoire de Zaouré Bažeeva-Schuster«
Composed 2020, final fair copy 22.4.2022
The second Impromptu consists of two main elements: on the one hand, floating spectral harmonic movements; and on the other hand, music reminiscent of a music box, interspersed with dotted rhythms. Although these two elements recur in a rudimentary form, they introduce thematic and harmonic material that cannot be identified either as a repetition or as a variation of previous material. The intention is rather that of continuous development, which results in the unfolding of new situations.
The voice leading that culminates in the dense final chord – it consists of a diminished triad with an added dissonant tritone – is noteworthy. The final chord in the melody is reached by a whole-tone ascent of , while the bass note A is chromatically reached via an A flat. The parallels of the concluding melody notes E – F sharp – G sharp to the harmony notes F – G – A, which are partially obscured by the voice leading, also contribute to this final effect.
III La façon dont dont il parlait et marchait, pensait et riait (duration: 2'40'')
»à la memoire de Michael Ingham«
Composed 2020, final fair copy 25.4.2022
A quiet entrance marks the beginning of this piece. Echoes of light swing rhythms develop from the opening secco chords. The memory of Michael Ingham's casual way of moving, laughing and speaking, as well as his intellectual and critical thoughts, have inspired the development of this piece as much as shared experiences.
IV Vagues scintillantes sous un soleil éclatant (duration: 4'16'')
»à la memoire de Toshi Ichiyanagi«
Composed 2020, final fair copy 12.6.2022
The piece originates from a vision of a lake's rippled waves, glittering and refracted multiple times in the glistening sunlight. These waves are represented by rhythmic trills spanning a whole tone. These trill chains are connected by variously modulating five-note chordal structures, often remotely reminiscent of cadential effects in tonal music. A short march-like section appears in the third part as a contrast.
V Sur une barque légère dans des canaux sombres (duration: 3'57'')
»à mon ami Claus-Christian Schuster«
Composed 2020, final fair copy 3.7.2022
Vague reminiscences of Venice characterize the opening of the piece, a barcarolle that is meant to be performed very fast. The middle section of the piece, reminiscent of a Romanian hóra, mirrors the morbidly absurd atmosphere of carnivalesque celebrations in a doomed city.
VI Dans les abysses de l'âme (duration: 4'46'')
»à la mémoire d‘un homme sans nom«
Composed 2020, final fair copy 21.7.2022
The peculiar meter of 15/16, resulting from the combination of 3/8 + 3/16 + 3/8, immediately guides us towards an inner exploration of a maze of acoustic events. Reinforced by striking tempo changes, harmonically ambivalent through progressions that are both dissonant and tonally unstable, and increasingly intense persistent note and chord repetitions, the piece contains many unexpected twists. In doing so, it pushes open doors and provides gateways to secret realms. The piece thus becomes a search for one's own path, one's own language, perhaps also one's own identity, only to discover that this too ultimately remains unattainable.
DEUXIÈME CAHIER
[Second volume]
Duration: approx. 24 minutes
VII Dans la forêt enchantée (duration 4'02'')
»à Walter Schirnik, ami de mes compositions«
Composed 2020-22, final fair copy 28.12.2022
For me, the Enchanted Forest represents an allegory of captivity that involves many facets of threat and confusion, but also of wonder and amazement. Escape from this forest does not seem possible in this piece.
The enchanted forest is musically symbolized through a wide-ranging palette of unusual harmonic combinations. The well-known saying "You can't see the forest for the trees" permeates the harmonic content of this Impromptu: one harmony follows another, sometimes in rapid succession, because we are dealing with a young, still pliable, fast-growing forest, a forest of diverse chords and their combinations, expressing fear but also hope, abruptly harboring new situations, new dangers, but also new possibilities. At the same time, it is endangered, like the Amazon rainforest, which is increasingly being destroyed by human foolishness. Will it also go up in smoke, as it does at the end of this impromptu, and thus no longer offer protection for the survival of mankind?
VIII Larmes d’un ange tombé – pétrifié (duration 4'25'')
»à la mémoire des enfants israéliens, palestiniens et ukrainiens assassinés«
Composed 2020, final fair copy 28.5.2023
To me, this title – the petrified tears of a fallen angel – is a metaphor for the utmost internalization of an insatiable longing for the past and grief over transience.
Don’t we all stumble in one way or another in the thicket of missed opportunities? Stumbling also through the failure to remain true to ideals and the inability to realize big, bold ideas? Are we not even able to express our sadness about our failures, are our tears petrified, as the fallen angels appear to be petrified?
The musical essence of this impromptu moves between soft, floating chords, erupting dance elements, strict, almost ceremonial step elements, and chains of trills symbolizing tears, revealing the vague form of a rondo.
IX Prismes de Métamorphoses atmosphériques (duration 4'00'')
»à mon ami, le grand pianiste Johannes Piirto«
Composed July 2020, final fair copy 19.6.2023
Two superimposed simple intervallic structures – two-part parallel seconds and a repeated one-part decimal step – form the recurring beginning of the piece, which re-appears in various metamorphoses. Sometimes the intervals of the two structures are changed, then the two-part structure is narrowed to a one-part melodic line or extended into a three-part harmonic line.
Between this "genetic code" lie fields of harmonic development, whose acoustic refractions create the "atmospheric prisms" to which the title of the piece refers. These often-surprising turns also produce melodic elements, with means of harmonic stretching, but also condensation, exerting great influence on the development and form of the piece.
X Dans la chaleur étouffante de l´été (duration 3'22'')
Composed 22.8.2020, final fair copy 16.1.2024
In the sultry heat of summer
In the midst of seemingly amorphous floating harmonies, individual elements continuously emerge: recurrent five-part chords, repeating sequences of clearly defined harmonic progressions, and analogies to classical cadential formations. However, the piece never regresses to the familiar world of major-minor tonality, although there are playful attempts at emulating the resolution of dissonances.
These developments are framed by a ten-measure introductory section, in which the harmonic intervals of the piece are initially presented individually, and an oscillation of the last chord ultimately just comes to a halt.
XI Mouvements irréguliers dans des espaces asymétriques (duration 3'09'')
Composed 6.9.2020 – final fair copy 29.1.2024
Irregular movements in asymmetrical spaces
As the title suggests, the piece is divided into spaces of different sizes (≠ time units) that appear highly differentiated through the presence of irregularly long and rhythmically animated patterns. The composition strives for the greatest possible number of different structural approaches: phrases that accentuate the main emphasis in a measure (the "one") alternate with upbeat structures, resulting in irregular and regular meters. The interplay between short sixteenth- and long eighth-notes as well as the alternation of homogeneous and developing dynamics also play an important role in the creation of different characters and tempi, which lend the piece an impression of great volatility. This effect is amplified through the rapid opening tempo and its recapitulation, and is additionally aided by the intrusion and development of slower tempo units as well as the ending that is shaped by its descent into the lower registers.
XII Tendant vers l’orient (duration 3'55'')
Composed 27.9.2020 Fair copy 11.2.2024
Drawn to the Orient
The mythical fairytale magic of the Orient has left deep traces in European cultural history. However, our perception is colored by misunderstandings and illusions that, as the cultural philosopher Edward W. Said emphatically demonstrated in his book Orientalism, are not due solely to language barriers.
This piano piece neither attempts to correct this distorted image of the Orient, nor to integrate Arabic musical traditions, as Friedrich Cerha, for example, tried to do in his string quartets through his preoccupation with Arabic maqams; rather, it constitutes an echo of the ongoing interest in the Middle East, like a reminder of the enthusiasm the Orient has generated in the last three centuries.
The piece, which begins in an enthusiastic and youthful manner, only to gradually descend into a slow movement that fades away through a frequently interrupted ritardando, is nevertheless about freedom of expression and playing, as we encounter it in improvised monophonic Arabic maqams. It is not their intervals or tonality that inform the piece, but rather the distinctive freedom of the art of oriental improvisation.
The piece is decidedly not merely a study in improvisation. Gestures and motifs rise and fall over a chordal constellation, from which a very memorable short break consisting of two elements emerges just before the end: a precisely articulated but formally developed rhythm, set harmonically in tritones; and at the same time rapid figurations with repetitive pitch accelerandi that move freely in the opposite direction of the left-hand rhythms, before finally fading away into Nirvana.
The longing for an Orient that only exists in our Western imagination ...
TROISIÉME CAHIER
[Third volume]
Duration: approx. ## minutes
XIII Dans le brouillard d’un jour gris de novembre (duration 3'42'')
composed 12.11.2020, final fair copy 17.2.2024
In fog, on a gray November day
This impromptu is characterized by contrasts between harmonic movements that are softly blurred through the use of pedal and sharply outlined sounds, and contrasts between gently low and penetratingly high five-part harmony as well as repetitive monophony and shifted rhythms.
Out of the veiled, mystical-sounding beginning emerges a melodic fragment that is gradually condensed into homophonic five-part phrases of varying lengths.
The end of the composition is heralded by a recitative-like passage in triple meter. A two-part interplay of simultaneously sounding triplets and duplets leads into echoes of a funeral march, whose conclusion, a cadenza-like structure consisting of three chords, brings the piece to a standstill.
XIV Jeunesse orageuse (duration 1'21'')
composed 13.11.2020, final fair copy 29.2. 2024
Stormy youth
"Precipitato" ("with haste") is Sergei Prokofiev’s heading for the third and final movement of his Piano Sonata op. 83, the second of his War Sonatas composed between 1940 and 1944. It also appears at the beginning of this XIV Impromptu; here, however, completely different compositional principles are at play.
While Prokofiev’s fascinating harmony is based on the functional harmony of the 19th and early 20th centuries, this Impromptu is based on modern comparative experiments with different harmonies, which form the foundation of the resulting musical figures. The shortening of the 2/4 time signature into a 7/8 meter results in the “rushed” character of the "Precipitato"; this effect is reinforced by the rapid tempo and the dense five-part texture of the piece. Despite the precipitato, precision and power are necessary for the flow and vitality of a performance.
XV Le petit V. V. joue avec ses soldats de plomb (duration 2'15'')
composed 13.11.2020, final fair copy 12.3.2024
Little V. V. plays with his tin soldiers
Visions of war intertwine in the character of a rapid march, in which the little dictator with his army of tin soldiers dreams of great imperial victories in his imagination, and smiles blissfully towards his glorious future – or is it a deceptive future?