Sequitur V

About

Sequitur is a series of compositions for various solo instruments and live-electronics which I started in 2008. Somehow it can be seen as a reference to Berio’s famous “Sequenze” cycle of solo pieces which focus on specific playing techniques of the respective instrument. Up to now I have finished more than a dozen pieces including orchestral instruments like flute and violin, but also for voice and more exotic ones such as electric guitar, toy piano and kalimba. All Sequitur composition use a software written in MaxMSP which creates an electronic accompaniment from the instrument’s live input; the player is confronted with his own playing, and this creates a situation like moving in a house of mirrors where the identities becomes blurred. Most of the pieces can be performed by the player alone who just has to press a key on the computer keyboard whenever this is indicated in the score. The software generates a complex canon on the fly, the temporal structure and density of which being controlled by random operations. This yields different results every time the piece is performed. Although following a precisely notated score, there is always a good portion of surprise for the musician which emphasizes his awareness and attentiveness.

Having written several pieces for the toy piano before, I dedicated Sequitur V to this interesting instrument which — in fact — has not much in common with the piano as we know it. Its sound resembles chimes or maybe parts of a gamelan orchestra and therefore is not connected to the great history of classical piano music from Bach to Stockhausen; a fact that makes this instrument more accessible for me. Although the toy piano is tiny in every respect, the sound that it produces in Sequitur V becomes incredibly rich thanks to amplification and realtime sound processing.

Après avoir écrit plusieurs pièces pour piano-jouet, j’ai consacré Sequitur V à cet intéressant instrument qui n’a, en fait, pas beaucoup à voir avec le piano tel que nous le connaissons habituellement. Sa sonorité ressemble à un carillon ou, peut-être, à certains instruments d’un orchestre de gamelan. Ainsi, cet instrument n’est pas relié à la grande histoire de la musique écrite pour piano classique, de Bach à Stockhausen, et cela me le rend encore plus accessible. Bien que le piano-jouet soit très petit en chacun de ses aspects, le son qu’il produit dans Sequitur V devient incroyablement riche, grâce à l’amplification et au traitement en temps réel.

Score

The score of Sequitur V can be downloaded for free. Please note that the music is protected by copyright.

Recording

This recording of Sequitur V can be downloaded for free. Please consider that the files are released under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 License and must not be modified.

Isabel Ettenauer and Karlheinz Essl rehearsing Sequitur V at the Essl Museum
4 Aug 2008

Updated: 5 Feb 2012