Stille Waters, Diepe Gronden

Alto, prime, bass, contrabass, guitarrón, electric guitars, glockenspiel and marimba

Programme notes

The title, Stille Waters, Diepe Gronden (Flemish for: still waters have unfathomed depth), draws from the proverb suggesting that intelligence often lies in quietness and reserve.

The composition commences with the toss of a coin to determine which half of the orchestra will initiate the first of two "games." At predefined junctures, players must make choices between several musical strands according to a set of rules. The glockenspiel player serves as the timekeeper.

The piece employs a spontaneous chain of events: by rule, no section may be prepared during any rehearsal or performance. Consequently, the two conductors' decisions are entirely dependent on their own prior choices and those of the players.

The two visible, lighthearted "games" represent the surface level of our consciousness, floating above the deeper meaning. Below that surface lies our deep and quiet alter ego, which is sonically expressed in two distinct textures: a low texture (featuring electric guitars, marimba, and glockenspiel) and a high texture composed of scintillating harmonics. The overarching "metarule" stipulates that the piece must be enjoyable for both the musicians and the listening audience.

Composition notes

The composition is structurally underpinned by the Lucas series, a sequence of integers named after the French mathematician Édouard Lucas (1842–1891).

The Lucas numbers (1, 3, 4, 7, 11, 18, 29, 47, 76, 123, 322) inform the piece's overall duration, time signatures, number of sections, number of repeats, and the number of possible choices available to the performers. The work employs an endecaphonic (eleven-pitch) row, which evolves according to the principles of Lindenmayer Systems (L-Systems), a formal grammar often used to model natural growth. Under this system, some pitches remain constant while others vary.

The composer manipulates the original row through several standard serial techniques, denoted as follows:

O. (Original row)
R. (Retrograde)
M. (Mirror, or Inversion)
Sh. (Shuffled—indicating that the pitches of the original row have been re-ordered).

Furthermore, a vertical black arrow pointing downwards in the score indicates specific musical measures from which a soloist must make a selection, introducing an element of controlled chance.

Handwritten sketches and drafts

to be found in chapter XVI of the white cover, A3 size, 600 pages sketchbook

Completion of the composition 11-V-2018