Serenade: Recomposed

Serenade:Recomposed

“memory, forgot” for two guitars, violin, viola & cello

Christian-Frédéric Bloquert

Serenade:Recomposed

FULL SCORE

DURATION: c.9 min

Cover art by Victoria Bloquert.

Christian-Frédéric Bloquert

cfbloquertmusic@gmail.com

www.christianfredericbloquert.com

“memory, forgot” for two guitars, violin, viola & cello

For Miro Magloire.

commissioned by the New York Choreographic Institute

ABOUT THE PIECE

This piece was commissioned by the New York Choreographic Institute and written for Miro Magloire, who choreographed the performance.

The intention was always to base the piece off of the first movement of Tchaikovsky’s Serenade for Strings - both for the dance and the music. Indeed, since the ballet itself is well known we decided to take elements of it, and reconstruct it, reshape it and remould it for our purpose. Thus both the music and the dance exude aspects and motifs of the work it is originally based off of. Musically, the piece makes use of the three main motifs of the movement non sequentially and redevelops them in what I hope to be new and exciting ways. You will notice, in fact, that none of the motifs are outright stated as they are in the original with with closest apparition being the resolution at m.144.

In hommage to its predecessor, we decided to keep stringed instruments though with the notable addition of two guitarist. As a guitarist myself, I do enjoy the inclusion of guitar as much as possible and it so happened that, at the time of conception, I knew a New York guitar duo: Miles & Ziggy Johnston. This seemed like a unique opportunity to include such an instrumentation and so the part was specifically written with them in mind.

NOTATION

The given patten as fast as possible for the given duration.

Ricochet jeté.

Play by touching the string where you would play the notes without pressing down as you would an open harmonic.

Ad lib. Improvisation with open harmonics at the 5th, 7th and 12th fret of the guitar.

Hit the body of the guitar with your palm to make a low sound (bass drum).

The ticks are given to show the beat on which to change patterns. In this case, the pattern changes on beat 3 of the bar.

Hit the body of the guitar with your fingers - high and light percussive sound.

Slap the side of the guitar - high percussive sound (snare).

Irrational time signatures. The two irrational time signatures used in this piece are 5/12 and 5/24. In the case of the former, the quarter not of the bar takes on the tempo of the quartern note triplet of the previous bar.That is if ♩= 104 at m.43, then ♩ = 156 at m.44. Or,

the triplet at m.43 is equal to the quarter at m.44. The same applies at 148; the triplet eight note of m.147 becomes the eight note of m.148.

Slap the string with the thumb.

PERFORMANCE NOTES

Some note should be taken of the repeat sings at m.1, m. 3, m76 and m.78. I invite performers to play with the length of the repeats - particularly if they are in a very reverberant space. If they are in a dryer environment, then it should be kept to a singular repeat. The same could be applied at the end (m.162-163); here, given a reverberant space, the guitarists may choose to lengthen the time it takes to completely fade a niente.

Given than this piece is build upon the motifs of Tchaokovsky’s Serenade for Strings, performers should be mindful of the counterpoint throughout. The individual gestures should be played as distinctly as possible as the motifs are present throughout even if subtly so.

The solos at m.22, m.25 and m.116 should not be obscured by the accompaniment and should be allowed to be heard throughout. Similarly, the string figure m.51-56 and m.59-61 should not overpower the counterpuntal lines played by the guitars.

The section at m.36 is also of particular note as it is a recurring features of the piece. Here the pulse should be felt as the the 8th note with the 16th notes serving as rhythmic shifts moving the beat off of the pulse. Since there is no constant meter, the syncopation is not necessarily felt though it is implied.

The return to the pulse at m.123 should also be considered; the voice exchange at play between the strings should not be overpowered by the accompaniment through out.

Lastly, I would invite performers to pay special attention to the rhythmic complexities of the piece as the absolute tightness of the ensemble is paramount to a successful performance.

I hope that you enjoy playing this piece and I remain at your disposal were you to have any questions.