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i, recita!

Date

4,25-5,12 2022

Instrumentation

cantor—chant

2vv(AT—opt.SB)

continuo(basso & effetto)

Length

less than 3'

Score

Comments

The word anchors the page. The cantor, chant, alto, and tenor are directly acted upon by the word. The soprano and bass lines are detached: they could be wordless, but they also could follow the word, albeit at a more indeterminate rate. All of these main voices are always solo in their incarnations, except for situations where the chant line brings them all together; thus, the instrumentation is always variable: four voices to a page because that represents the maximum harmonic structure of the tetrachord, but harmonic complexity might occur if there are continuo alterations.

The outer voices represent the pure A2-A4 structure, while the inner voices and harmonic qualities of the continuo proceed according to the modulation of the tetrachord. Thus it could be said that the reasoning behind a newer indeterminate continuo structure is to promote a certain at will experience of the music, which leads to certain textural and harmonic implications in individual choices. What is meant to occur exists within the five line staff, the means to what is possible appears outside of it. In terms of craft and compositional aims I've satisfied most of my desires in the act of composition itself, but in terms of aesthetics, much remains to the whims of fate.

The structural qualities of the music are totally tied to the text, not simply in layout, but also in formal and structural development, thus there isn't so much coherency in the standard sense of musical composition; rather, it's much more akin to tableaux vivant, unified by an overarching structural skeleton and composed around natural patterns found in that text, extrapolated and twisted like the modulations of the tetrachord.

Sean Patrick Ignatius Tartaglia