Dying of the Light details

brucecrossman

Dying of the Light: Pacific Resonance for Peter

for soprano saxophone (2014) (for soprano saxophone (Bb) [transposed]; for alto saxophone (Eb); 1 E-note crotales [sounds two octaves higher than written] with brass mallet or small Japanese temple bowl with bead striker; voice [at pitch]); duration: 9′ 46″

score available from AMC

Brenton Broadstock, Peter Sculthorpe, Bruce Crossman and Ian Shanahan, Art Park, Sapporo, 1990
Brenton Broadstock, Peter Sculthorpe, Bruce Crossman and Ian Shanahan, Art Park, Sapporo, 1990

program note My purpose in writing this piece was to create a work for my colleague—Katia Beaugeais—that captured the meditative stillness and living colour fluctuations of the Japanese Honkyoku tradition, reinterpreted for soprano saxophone as a tribute to one of my mentors—Peter Sculthorpe. The piece begins in the ritualised stillness of crotales ringing, as if being a Buddhist prayer bell, and emerges into glossolalia type chanting from the Judaic Christian tradition with shakuhachi-like explosions of air, panting and arch-like exuberant melodic phrases—peppered with grace-note articulations and flourishes to energize it. The ritualised crotales and chant sounds recur as restful refrains and meditative moments throughout the work, whilst exuberantly free bursts of Gagaku-derived Pacific harmony gradually reveal themselves throughout the piece; these climax in an exuberant and liberated athletic section utilising the rich colour range of the soprano saxophone. In quick snatches of sound, the climactic resonance gradually ebbs back to panting, ritualised chant and crotales, and distilled stillness that dies into a sub-tone flourish.

Katia Beaugeais (sop-sax), recording at ABC Studios, Sydney, 17 October 2018
Dying of the Light, (bars 19-29)—Bells, chant and living colour
Dying of the Light, (bars 19-29)—Bells, chant and living colour

Commission note: Katia Beaugeais originally commissioned Dying of the Light: Pacific Resonance for Peter for performance at 17th World Saxophone Congress, Strasbourg, France in July 2015. However, it was Beaugeais’ premiere with a flowing and detailed performance of Dying of the Light: Pacific Resonance for Peter at XVIII World Saxophone Congress 2018 in Zagreb, Croatia that finally brought the work to an amazing realisation.

ADOLPHESAX.COM: The Saxophone Web Site: Dying of the Light: Pacific Resonance for Peter by Bruce Crossman Katia Beaugeais XVIII World Sax

 

Published by brucecrossman