Songs for Simon (piano, audio track)

Commissioned for Simon Tedeschi by Jack Richards for the SOUNZtender Project, Songs for Simon is a work for solo piano and digital audio.  

‍Donald Nicolson (pf) premiered the piece for SOUNZtender Concert at the Ilott Theatre, Wellington Town Hall, Wellington, New Zealand on May 30th 2010.

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Programme Note

Songs for Simon (2010) For Solo Piano & Digital Audio (JP/SS)

I. His Second Time 4:00

II. Minos 4:15

III. Demonic Thesis 5:45

Work Duration 14:00 minutes

This work was created as part of an intitiatve by SOUNZ, the Centre for new Zealand Music, where a number of NZ composers allowed themselves to be put up for 'auction' to compose new pieces for the highest bidder, and have the commission fee go to SOUNZ. A fundraiser.

It was a strange commissioning process but I leaned into the opportunity of writing a new work for Jack C. Richards' recommended performer, Australian pianist Simon Tedeschi. All three movement titles are anagrams of Simon's full or first name, but as far as I'm aware, Simon has never performed the work.

The first movement is something I wrote for my mother, Anastasia - who was often having me on about never having dedicated a work to her. By the time I wrote it, she had Alzheimer's and was at a stage where she was still present in her surroundings but quickly forgot many things that had very recently been said or done. When she first heard this movement and I explained it to her (over Skype) she cried and cried, and told me she loved it. The next day she had no memory of it, or her response to it. Thsi is why I adapted the end with a reverb effect to have the piano disappear into a cloud of forgetting; the performer actually stops before the music end and we hear the echo fo their plahying in the receding distance.

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The Second movement was inspired by the music of Morton Feldman, particularly his materpiece for piano and string quartet. I had fallen in love with the idea of a hanging mobile, slowly turing and revealing different aspects of its shape as it rotated. This movement soudns free and dreamy but it's a monster on the page. Especially because it's synchronised with the tape part.

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The third movement has an energy (and shape) that I love. It was adapted for Strike Percussion's Between Zero and One show, and renamed Superluminal. In making that adaptation, the drum set part (originally played by computer) had to be realised in the real world. For that I have to thank Leni Selusi who figured it out. I nearly made a further adaptation of this movement for 6 pianos - I think it would have been terrific. One day, one day...

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The piece was eventually recorded by Donald Nicolson and there are some terrific videos from the sessions - by Keith Hill - below.

And the Chris Mason-Batley Group explored the piece is an improvised context - these extraordinary recordings are alos available below as audio-only videos.

Resources

RESEARCHERS: EXPLORE SONGS FOR SIMON SOLO PIANO AND DIGITAL AUDIO AT THE ALEXANDER TURNBULL LIBRARY