'50 Florentine Breaths' for amplified solo flute, duration c.14 minutes.
- Submitting institution
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Royal College of Music
- Unit of assessment
- 33 - Music, Drama, Dance, Performing Arts, Film and Screen Studies
- Output identifier
- 4
- Type
- J - Composition
- Month
- -
- Year
- 2017
- URL
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http://researchonline.rcm.ac.uk/id/eprint/802/
- Supplementary information
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- Request cross-referral to
- -
- Output has been delayed by COVID-19
- No
- COVID-19 affected output statement
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- Forensic science
- No
- Criminology
- No
- Interdisciplinary
- No
- Number of additional authors
-
-
- Research group(s)
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- Proposed double-weighted
- No
- Reserve for an output with double weighting
- No
- Additional information
- The commission was for a work to be recorded on CD so I decided to utilize the intimacy of sound that a recording can have and compose a very quiet piece which would closely capture the details of the breath of the performer. In aiming to communicate this idea directly and poetically, I structured the work as a series of phrases, each built from a single slow breath. In each of these the similar air sounds of the inhalations are followed by a variety of different qualities of sounds colouring the following exhalations. The challenge was to introduce enough variety within the phrases to reveal the different possibilities of sound in a consistent but surprising way which never obscures the large-scale procession of shapes which form the structure of the piece. I articulated the exhalations through two fingered pitches, a G and Eb above middle C, low enough to contain a rich variety of harmonics and clearly distinguishable from one another. These are further varied through the addition of a series of fingered clicks which momentarily move the pitch down one tone, and which appear within three different tempi. Further possibilities for change within the exhalation include remaining on the same note or changing midway, shading the exhalations with different vowel sounds and using whistle tones. Choosing these variables involved listening closely to demonstrations of a long list of possible timbral colourings played by the commissioning flautist. My priority in the final selection was that no single element would dominate over any other. I numbered the various possibilities and, using dice chose the order in which they would be presented. Since the CD’s release in 2018 50 Florentine Breaths has been played live twice with amplification. Currently two more performances are planned in Italy and London.
- Author contribution statement
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- Non-English
- No
- English abstract
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