Next Sunday, the Tallinn Filharmoonia will give the European premiere of my Multiplicity. It’s a cool program, with music by Erkki-Sven Tüür, John Adams and Paul Trapkus. Wish I could be there for it — snowy streets start to sound appealing this time of year – but I have commitments here.
Multiplicity was commissioned by violinist Danielle Belén; she premiered it in 2012 in Los Angeles. Video evidence here. I wrote it when I was working (musically) through Italo Calvino’s Memos for the Next Millenium, in which he lays out five artistic principles:
- Lightness
- Quickness
- Exactitude
- Visibility
- Multiplicity
With Multiplicity, Calvino references the endless significances that can be drawn from any idea or event – it’s about finding the infinite in the infinitesimal. I’m sure my composition falls far short of that ideal, but it finds what it can in the materials at hand, and has a lovely time doing so.
For details about the performance, check out this link.
Danielle Belen premiering Multiplicity with Colburn students