Postcards (previously titled 'Short Stories'): for String Orchestra

TY - ADVS

T1 - Postcards (previously titled 'Short Stories')

T2 - for String Orchestra

A2 - Suckling, Martin Charles

PY - 2013

Y1 - 2013

N2 - Originally described as ‘postcards’, these pieces were written for the Scottish Ensemble’s 2012-13 season, with one included in each of their UK tours. Although the musical idea underlying each piece might fit on the back of a postcard, the result is a little more substantial than such a title suggests –hence ‘short story’. They can be performed individually or as a complete set.I – Chimes at MidnightA series of bells. From within the resonance, echoes of a dance emerge, and a high violin sings.II – Mr Jonathan Morton, His GroundWhere the violin leads, the others follow, eventually arriving at rich, gleaming microtonal chords covering all registers. Throughout the whole piece a simple melodic phrase loops over and again.III – TouchA toccata of scurrying semiquavers in which the players join, separate, and recombine in ever-changing groupings to create a many-voiced polyphony. The journey repeats – though with each iteration it is squeezed into smaller and smaller spaces, until eventually it is barely there at all. IV – In MemoriamStepping out into what seemed to be the first day of Spring: barely a breeze, and the sunlight warm against my face. A sequence of microtonal harmonies gradually transform into singing cello lines backed by fragments of dance and birdsong.

AB - Originally described as ‘postcards’, these pieces were written for the Scottish Ensemble’s 2012-13 season, with one included in each of their UK tours. Although the musical idea underlying each piece might fit on the back of a postcard, the result is a little more substantial than such a title suggests –hence ‘short story’. They can be performed individually or as a complete set.I – Chimes at MidnightA series of bells. From within the resonance, echoes of a dance emerge, and a high violin sings.II – Mr Jonathan Morton, His GroundWhere the violin leads, the others follow, eventually arriving at rich, gleaming microtonal chords covering all registers. Throughout the whole piece a simple melodic phrase loops over and again.III – TouchA toccata of scurrying semiquavers in which the players join, separate, and recombine in ever-changing groupings to create a many-voiced polyphony. The journey repeats – though with each iteration it is squeezed into smaller and smaller spaces, until eventually it is barely there at all. IV – In MemoriamStepping out into what seemed to be the first day of Spring: barely a breeze, and the sunlight warm against my face. A sequence of microtonal harmonies gradually transform into singing cello lines backed by fragments of dance and birdsong.

M3 - Composition

PB - Faber Music Ltd.

CY - London

ER -