Composing Today

9 February 2007
The piece has reached a strange place. The second ritornello is effectively complete and I’ve moved into what would be the clarinet solo section. Unfortunately, I’m having a hard time getting a sense of what the sound of this area of the piece is. In some ways I’m confused about the larger scale architecture, even though I’m settled on the smaller scale architecture is for the work. Coming out of the opening ritornello is a 30 second section in which the entire ensemble plays in a complex contrapuntal manner eventually leading into the upper reaches before petering out and the piano enters solo. After this second ritornello, the clarinet has a small trio with the violin and flute in long notes accompanied by the nipple gongs and bass drum. This is interrupted by the entire ensemble, as happens in the piano solo, but this time it falls apart, two chords with the nipple gong and then that’s where I’m stuck. In thinking about this now – my initial feeling was to have the ensemble try to build to another climax, but I’m not sure.