Colloque (2023)

for soprano and chamber ensemble music by Jane Sheldon text by Etel Adnan

Colloque (2023)

Composed for the Sydney Symphony Orchestra Fellows, conducted by Roger Benedict.

Composer’s Note

This piece is a setting of fragments from Conversations with My Soul, a long poem by Etel Adnan, in which the speaker seems to be addressing a lover, a natural force (specifically, fog), and the self, all conflated into one entity at once familiar, faintly intimidating, and in need of comfort; and all able to be interpreted as something divine. Her poem opens with the line, “come along my fog.” In Colloque, the vocal line is intended to be incantatory while being relatively static, an invocation always held within the gently mobile timbral fog provided by the ensemble.

Instrumentation

Flute

Clarinet

Trumpet

Trombone

Soprano

Violin

Viola

Cello

Double bass

Duration: approx. 5’

Performance Notes

The score is in C.

The soprano should sit or stand within the ensemble, with the winds.

As a general rule, for the strings, whenever an open string can be used, use it.

This symbol occasionally appears in the middle of a sustained pitch. It indicates a brief, gentle microtonal bend above the notated pitch and then back down.

Similarly, this symbol occasionally appears in the middle of a sustained pitch. It indicates a brief, gentle microtonal bend below the notated pitch and then back up.

It is for the player to determine precisely when these bends occur within the pitch on which the symbol appears.

Clarinet

This piece uses 2 B flat clarinet multiphonics, both sourced from clarinettist Heather Roche’s online guide:

https://heatherroche.net/2018/09/13/27-easy-bb-clarinet-multiphonics/

No. 12

No. 115

It is not important for the two pitches to speak in perfect simultaneity or with an even balance; their inherent instability is desirable.

Fingerings for the microtonal pitches in the clarinet part are sourced from here: https://www.jasonalder.com/fingeringchart/Clarinet_quarter-tone_fingering-chart--Jason_Alder.pdf

Timbral trills should be rendered with alternation between two fingerings. The alternation needn’t be rapid.

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