w14172
| Title | Ceithre Ráithe na Cláirsí : Version for Piano |
| Contributors |
Derek Ball (composer) |
| Composition date | 2001 |
| Duration (mins) | 10 |
| Category | keyboard |
| Instrumentation | Pf |
| Commissioned by | |
| Key signature | |
| First line | |
| First performed | |
| Notes | |
| Programme Note | In 1995 I attended a lecture during a celtic harp festival in Dinan, Brittany. It was the first time I became aware of the connection between the cláirseach, in its traditional construction, and the seasons of the year. Although not always copied in modern designs, he original cláirseach has a 'jewel' or boss at the top of the pillar and three holes in the sound box. The construction is such that, if the harp is placed in the midday sun at the winter solstice the shadow of the jewel falls on the upper sound hole. A the spring and autumn equinoxes the shadow is on the middle hole. At the summer solstice it is on the lower one. This led me to associate the upper strings of the cláirseach with winter, the lower strings with summer, and the middle strings with spring and autumn, and to write a cláirseach piece which used this insight to reflect the annual cycle of seasons. The piece was called "Ceithre Ráithe na Cláirsi." Many years later I heard the pianist Owen Lorigan playing a lovely piece by Irish composer Deirdre McKay which somehow brought back to me the idea of my own earlier piece, and I resolved to arrange "Ceithre Ráithe" for piano. The result is a re-composition in a more pianistic idiom, preserving the atmosphere of the cláirseach original. |
This work is associated with the following collection items:
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