Implacable Gifts
(concerto for two pianos and orchestra)
2.2.2.2-4.2.3.1-timp, 2pc, hp - 2 pf - strings
duration 22:00 © 2018 Faber Music
sample
performed by Lane & Stott with Tasmanian Symphony (cond. Macdonald)
sample
performed by Lane & Stott with Tasmanian Symphony (cond. Macdonald)
sample
performed by Lane & Stott with Tasmanian Symphony (cond. Macdonald)
sample
performed by Lane & Stott with Tasmanian Symphony (cond. Macdonald)
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Also see: Concertos Orchestral Piano | Program Note: Implacable Gifts
- Irresistible Urges
- Folk Story
- Fairytale
- Inevitable Conclusion
The principle of a concerto with a single soloist is well understood: the soloist is a hero assisted, and sometimes challenged, by the orchestra. But what is the rationale for two heroes? Are they at war, competing, collaborating, or just chatting? While wondering how to reconcile these options, I was assailed by a stream of musical ideas perfect for two pianos with accompaniment, but which didn’t conform to a wider architectural scheme.
These ideas were so persistent that they simply demanded inclusion, leaving me to find a binding principle later on. This situation brought to mind The Arrival of Implacable Gifts, the 1985 painting by Australian surrealist James Gleeson (1915-2008) in which disparate dazzling images are woven into a roiling sea of intrigue. Gleeson spoke, about this painting, of gifts dropping from the sky, things that we longed for but which on arrival became unavoidable, and not always completely welcome.
The first movement, Irresistible Urges, is a collection of the original striking sonic images that were the inescapable, implacable gifts that engendered the composition. The middle two movements emerged with distinctly narrative characteristics, and so became Folk Story and Fairytale, the latter becoming increasingly fanciful. Since music contains neither verbs nor nouns, I can’t tell exactly what the stories are, and invite the listener to imagine their own. The final movement returns to the ineluctable and inexorable, motifs that lead us to the unpreventable end of the music. Carl Vine, February 2018 Implacable Gifts was commissioned by Geoff Stearn for the West Australian Symphony Orchestra and co-commissioned by the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra. World premiere performances by Piers Lane and Kathryn Stott were conducted by Rory Macdonald with the West Australian Symphony Orchestra at the Perth Concert Hall on 11 & 12 May 2018, and with the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra at Federation Concert Hall Hobart on 19 May 2018. It is dedicated to Geoff Stearn. |
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