w14561
| Title | Moment in Time, A, Op 46 |
| Contributors |
John McLeod (composer) |
| Composition date | 2002 |
| Duration (mins) | 14 |
| Category | chamber quartet mixed |
| Instrumentation | Vn Cl Vc Pf |
| Commissioned by | The Hebrides Ensemble with subsidy from the SAC. |
| Key signature | |
| First line | |
| First performed | |
| Notes | |
| Programme Note | I've always been fascinated by the idea of time in all its aspects and this piece started to take shape after re-reading T.S. Eliot's Burnt Norton whose opening lines made me think in a much more abstract way than has been the case in my previous recent works. Time present and time past Are both perhaps present in time future, And time future contained in time past. If all time is eternally present All time is unredeemable. This work, then, is an exploration of time - real, imagined, fractured, unsynchronised, changing. Another element is also present, as this piece was being composed during the dreadful events of 11 September. The huge emotional response to this outrage has inevitably influenced much of the music. In Metamorphosis various ideas are stated and developed and the musical material is mainly aggressive with rapid changed of time and unsynchronised playing. The writing is very virtuosic with a whole series of cadenza-like sequences. The final section is a Threnody which ends with the opening bars of Messiaen's Quartet for the End of Time for which this present work might serve a a Prelude. |
This work is associated with the following collection items:
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