Czernowin, Chaya: String Quartet

In this work, the quartet becomes a single composite instrument. This instrument cannot play individual sounds but rather composite gestures, of which the initial impulse linked to the production of a sound is an integral element. In a journey to Thailand, I visited Wat Arun, “the Temple of Dawn.” First from a distance, it appeared as a majestic looming tower possessing a monolithic form. It was then of extreme surprise to proceed closer only to discover that the tower was actually comprised from thousands of small shards of ceramic plates. From the closer perspectival proximity, these small shards created intricate filigreed patterns. The play between the presence of the temple’s totality and its fractured parts helped to provide both the material and formal conceptions for this quartet. The piece is built from three movements with two “sonic windows” between them. In the first movement, the composite sounds are introduced and form phrases interjections, and a part of a song; the second movement is similar to an improvisation using these composite sounds; the last movement is a speech composed of the fragments from the first two movements. The piece is dedicated to the Arditti String Quartet. – Chaya Czernowin & Steven Kazuo Takasugi