Lumen Christi [2.17 Piano Sonata

e r m l P a n d r e w / A o. C & o l © N o v e l on hearing early performances of the piece of watching an endless and impossibly slow helicopter-shot receding upwards from a summit so that other views gradually come into the frame without losing focus on the summit itself…but these are my impressions, and I hope each listener will have his or her own, personal interpretation of the music.

©2002 Stuart MacRae

Performer's note: Stuart MacRae's Piano Sonata presents the performer with intimidating technical challenges, and I consider it the most difficult work I have tackled hitherto. Most particularly, the first few minutes of the first movement, which rapidly hurtle forward into a dizzy whirlwind of a climax, require the most absolute alertness from the performer and are extremely exciting to play and to hear. Perhaps even more difficult is striking the Stuart Macrae

first chord of the second movement after nearly struggle, so often symbolised as the climbing of a eight minutes of some of the most energetic and mountain. And indeed it was in my mind to find a violent piano playing possible - in performance,the musical expression of the sensation of climbing small pause between the movements can be among the complex topography of my favourite terrifying for the player. hills in the Cuillin of Skye. So certain ideas come into view, are obscured and reappear in a different In spite of these challenges, this piece, as with form, until finally they appear in their very closest MacMillan's Sonata, is clearly the work of a and most imposing guise. composer who completely understands the possibilities and capabilities of instrument and The more reflective second movement is to some performer, and it is an extraordinarily rewarding extent an expression of the calm and serenity I feel piece to perform. I sincerely hope that in the future on having gained the summit. I had the impression I shall have many opportunities to do so. -SS the overture to Henry Purcell's St Cecilia ode a guess as to what the title - "in time of war", Welcome to all the pleasures of 1683 (the other alluding to Haydn among others - relates. (in

variations are by William Matthias, Michael angustiis... II is composed for any of solo oboe,

Berkeley and Gerald Victory - the four cello or soprano, and can be performed alone or

composers represent the four countries of the simultaneously with the piano piece).

British Isles). However, only the tiniest fragments of what might be Purcell are heard, repeatedly None of these small works pretends to be more

shattered by a series of violent explosions; than it is: they are all successful and satisfying in

MacMillan's transformation of the original their own ways, and are vivid but succinct

material is heard here at a more sophisticated characterisations of mood through simple ideas.

level. By contrast, the Piano Sonata - the largest, and also earliest work in MacMillan's piano output - is

In a sense, the most 'original' of the small pieces far more complex and involved. The composer

are For Ian and in angustiis... I. These two pieces describes its composition thus:

owe much to Scottish traditional music, the former more directly so. MacMillan likens For Ian to some of Peter Maxwell Davies' "reflective and

I wrote my Piano Sonata during a bitter Ayrshire winter and recall the barren trees and

unassuming piano works". The piece is structured, like folk music, in a simple ABA

hard frozen ground of a landscape that was empty and silent but for the harsh, hollow cry from the rookeries. This is reflected in the form, giving the impression of a traditional piece

Sonata's tolling, mournful chords, with its f i l t e r e d t h ro u g h M a c M i l l a n ' s c r e at i ve

bursts of violent, or delicate and icy, figuration. consciousness. in angustiis... I also follows this

Throughout the three movements the music

form; here the outer sections are comprised of a conveys a mood of elegy, of despair and

folk-like melody in clusters over an uneasy walking bass. The middle section is surreal and atmospheric, with single notes and chords spread over the full range of the keyboard, played in free time in much the same manner as in Angel, but

desolation.

Stylistically, the Piano Sonata is very different from MacMillan's other piano works. His oeuvre can be separated into two discrete periods of compositional style, punctuated by the first with an unnerving rather than serene effect.The

string quartet, Visions of a November Spring, desolation of this music is characteristic of a

written in 1988 and revised in 1991. MacMillan number of MacMillan's works. Given that the

explained the quartet as being the closest thing to work appeared in October 2001, one can hazard