Abhanden for Chamber Orchestra
Most of my compositions are “readings” or “interpretations” of existing works. In these compositions, the tension between the various forms contributing to the identity of a musical utterance – score, live performance, recordings – is explored by heightening the distance between the musical work in question and its representation. In these “interpretations”, I often focus in on specific aspects, and especially, on expressive and affective qualities. This process is also a means of exploring my own tenuous relationship to the concert repertoire as a woman composer.
Abhanden is a simultaneous “interpretation” of two works, with a focus on specific aspects with shared or similar expressive qualities: Mahler’s Ich bin der welt abhanden gekommen – the third of Gustave Mahler’s five Rückert-lieder – and Charles Ives’ Unanswered question. One common aspect explored in Abhanden is a sense of suspended time, and a corresponding sense of open-endedness. This is expressed in the rising major second motif that begins Mahler’s song and its gentle unfolding over time, without a strong sense of resolution. Similarly, a lack of resolution is at the heart of Ives’ work, as clearly expressed by the title, and it is represented not only by the interplay and overlay of vastly different musical materials, but manifested as a musical material itself in the sustained cluster in the winds. Another common aspect is spaciousness: while Ives creates this sense by requesting that the musicians be physically separated through the use of off-stage space, Mahler creates this sense through a warm and colourful but sparse instrumental choice that distributes the musical materials in disparate spaces of the orchestra. The overall affect of both works is somewhat enigmatic, with a touch of nostalgia and melancholy, of both longing and an acceptance of distance or of loss. In this composition, Ives’ cluster serves as a space of loss into which the other materials fall, more deeply as the piece continues, until the music dissolves into a vibrating cluster, a kind of black hole of loss and after-loss.
