Description
Composer’s Notes
“A unique evocative work with featured moments in all parts. Accessible extended techniques employed to give a powerful and extraordinary voice ….. a new experience!
“The bulk of ‘Within…’ was sketched in 1999. As things turned out it was not completed until 2003 when it was given its first performance by the composer in a version for solo flute and CD with the soloist taking some of the principle lines from the various parts on flute, piccolo & alto/bass. The first performance with seven flautists was by course members at the Stratford-upon-Avon Flute Festival in 2004.
“The personal musical inspiration, character, sole of the piece is rather difficult to describe; this is reflected in the title perhaps. Some mileage maybe made out of the fact that the original sketch was made in the same year as the solo flute piece Zoom Tube was completed and, of course, it post dates Orange Dawn. Therefore musical explorations of the flute and former influences were probably at play. In a technical sense there can be some subtle and more obvious parallels drawn with these pieces should the listener be familiar; which is not at all a requirement.
“It is fundamentally in three/four sections with close harmony breath sounds in the opening & closing and an evocative melodic line using microtonal passing notes and grace note articulations. This line is carried by the first flute at the beginning and is passed around the group as the piece progresses with the alto and bass flutes employed in their rather haunting higher registers. In the more brooding and rhythmic 2nd section several devices including percussive articulation, singing & playing, breath ramps and intricate tremolo patterns are used to build to a grand, tempestuous reprise of the main theme on piccolo & alto. This then gives way to the haunting ebb & flow of the final section. Some parts require B footjoint” – Ian Clarke
