The Irremediable

Programme notes

The Irremediable is the 4th piece of No Face, an evening-long piece that was premiered on 03-XII-1999 in the black box studio theatre of LASALLE-SIA College of the Arts in Singapore. No Face is based on Les Fleurs du Mal (Flowers of Evil), a celebrated collection of verses written in 1845 by French poet Charles Baudelaire. Poem number 84 is titled L’Irrémédiable. Irremediable means something that is impossible to alter, something beyond redemption. From the first intense chords, the music surges forward without restraint and with inescapable strength, all the way until the final chords. A last high pitch f sharp tolls nineteen times in the distance. This refers to Baudelaire’s opening verse Une Idée, une Forme, un Etre Parti de l’azur…  (a Dream, a Form, a Creature, Fallen from the azure realms). My piece calls for four players on a vibraphone, a keyboard, a (normal) grand piano, another piano tuned to the notes of a gamelan. The keyboardist must also amend the tuning of each note by a precise number of cents. So doing, the western 12-tone tuning system contrasts with a 19-tone tuning system. The intense wobbling sound in the theme is created by the keyboardist using a joy stick to bend the pitch. 

Handwritten sketches and drafts

to be found in the loose bundle of manuscripts and in the black cover logbook #1

Completion of the composition 

1-XII-1999

Quote 

"Pieces like The Irremediable stake out their unique sonic spaces, while drawing on ethnic musical elements"

Lee Shin-Kang, Singapore 

Review

"In The Irremediable , there are moments of inspired, wondrous sound-combinations”

Tan Shzr Ee, Singapore