A bloviated blog (S1/E4)

I envisioned that this blog would document a process in medias res, but it really is manifesting as more of a series of reflections. I want to take care to make sure not to let too much time intervene, in the interest of keeping the reflection as true as possible. There was no way for me to interrupt the surge of activity over the past two days to be posting here. But now, with three variations secure under my belt, I feel a natural sense of repose prior to moving on in the adventure.

The three matched instruments in a guitar trio can obviously all play all up and down the instrument’s range. But it is natural when writing for it to favor high notes for the first guitar, medium notes on Guitar 2, and assign most of the low notes to number 3. The range of my theme is slightly more than two octaves and I chose the middle guitar of the trio to make the initial statement, unaccompanied. As it is approaching the melody’s final cadence, it is joined by Guitar 3. Guitar 2 drops out, and Guitar 1, joining 3, plays the tune an octave higher. Although the theme is otherwise unaltered, I consider this the first variation because of the accompaniment that 3 is now providing. The two instruments play tune and accompaniment homorhythmically (identical rhythms), a technique I have invoked only seldom in my career, but it seemed appropriate here somehow. Again, at the tune’s final cadence, the texture is enriched by the addition now of the waiting Guitar 2. So, all three instruments are featured in the succeeding waltz which, you recall, actually occurred to me first. (I conjured the initial tune then, from this second variation, rather than the other way about!) Guitar 1 continues on melody in this waltz, but back down in the octave Guitar 2 had started things with.

Writing waltzes is as easy as falling off a log for me, but I had to gird myself for the slow variation I finished yesterday. The opening tune subsisted in a series of two-measure phrases all in the same rhythm; only a single grace-note breaks up the established pattern! This level of regularity is uncommon in my output, particularly in more recent works. I even considered tweaking the theme but thought better of it. One of my inner-plane teachers probably suggested something along the lines, “That’s what the variations will be for!” The waltz variation is similarly strict in rhythm, although I do allow myself a few more of those grace notes!

I did not choose Guitar 3 to lead the third variation because it was the only player not to get one yet. Rather, because the tune was lying so low. I seem to be following the model of Beethoven’s op. 34 piano Variations, where he cycles through various keys to end up in the one he started with only in his final variation. My initial tune (like Beethoven’s) is in F; my waltz variation is in A. This latest, slow variation is in A minor. Although the tune is still quite recognizable, it has lost all its perkiness and its metrical regularity to allow for this spontaneous expression of what I can only call grief.

That in itself took a lot out of me, but I also limited Guitar 2 to simple gestures in support of the implied harmony, and Guitar 1 to intermittent imitations of Guitar 3’s opening four-note turn. I look forward to putting this stark and desolate terrain behind me, in some music I feel bubbling up in me in 6/8 time.