Texture Notes: weak/strong
2019
for four female voices
7'
“The weak texture of the air changing as a train pulls away from its
station and a hollow develops, a delayed breeze takes hold, and the
uneven bonds of the neighborhood shimmy into place.
A stronger texture of reason, or texture of the reason why I didn’t get
on that train, or texture of a frame-by-frame rendering of the thought
process leading to the decision to not get on the train, coupled with a
late, too late, arrival, large bags in tow or some such excuse. What heaps
up against both sides of the closing train doors.”
Sawako Nakayasu, from collection Texture Notes (2003)
This poem by Japanese American Sawako Nakayasu expresses heaviness with lightness. There is a dramatic event that lead to a decision to not respond, “to not get on that train”. Yet it is expressed with delicacy of a breeze creating a hollow, an emptiness (or is it relief) when the opportunity has been passed. As originally written for the Quince Ensemble, I thought it is also a given that there needs to be virtuosity, and drama as well as humour involved in the same piece. I approached these from the perspective of different textures, timbre as well as spatial movement and depth that come from the placement and movement of the singers on stage. Although the piece is fully written, I wanted to weave into it the immediate and spontaneous, sometimes also surprising.