fiddle (2014) for string quartet [w/ score] / Chatori Shimizu

fiddle (2014)
for String Quartet
ca. 8 min.​
Program Note
I find myself standing in a small room; dark enough for my eyes to have to take some time to start seeing where I am. I see mirrors of every size cloak the walls, the ceiling, and the floor, reflecting endlessly in all directions. At the heart of the room rests a delicate wind-up toy of a ballerina, poised and waiting in a perfect suspended animation. I take three steps forward and kneel to wind the toy’s spring. Slowly and methodically, the ballerina begins to twirl clockwise.
I place her on the floor, watching her steady herself as I retreat. To my astonishment, her spin quickens, the rhythm tightening into a ceaseless spiral. The same brief motif loops over and over, each cycle locking into the next, as if chasing its own tail. Across every mirror in the room, the ballerina multiplies-her spinning reflections whirling faster and faster, each an echo of the other, lost in perpetual motion.
On Composition
The inspiration for "fiddle" first struck me after encountering J.J. Grandville’s 19th-century work "Apocalypse du ballet", where a ballerina spins to transform continuously, unfolding in disorienting, dream-like beauty. In "fiddle", the repetition of a single motif becomes the essence - a fixation where even the smallest variation or an unexpected silence feels like an accent, a shift that disrupts the trance.
Two years after its composition, "fiddle" was awarded First Prize at the Malta International Composition Competition and later published by United Music & Media Publishers (Belgium).
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Purchase Score: www.sheetmusic...
Issue Project Room Space - "Project ONKYO"
Mivos Quartet
Vn I Olivia De Prato
Vn II Marco Fusi
Vla Victor Lowrie
Vc Mariel Roberts
Mivos: www.mivosquart...
Chatori Shimizu: www.chatorishi...

[@machida5114]

sodelicious............................

[@SimonHutchinson]

Wow! Great piece and really nice performance (and recording too, for that matter). I love the interplay of the ensemble and the combination of the texture and harmonic language.