about
Trigger is my first work to incorporate elements of interactive electronic music in an acoustic composition. Instead of treating the duo as two independent musicians, I envisioned a single performer using one instrument to trigger events in another. This approach is extremely applicable to guitar and violin, both string instruments with similar left hand techniques, but with drastically different methods of producing sound: the pluck of the guitar is percussive, but lacks sustain, while the bowing of the violin provides sustain with a nuance of timbre. By writing essentially the same music for both instruments, my goal was to create what sounds like a violin/guitar hybrid, a combinatorial timbre of the two instruments. After a brief solo introduction, the violin leads the first half of Trigger. Any deviation in the guitar’s incessant, pulsing drones is triggered the violin’s disjunct melodic interjections. With a slightly more relaxed tone, the guitar begins the second half of the work directing the violin through a reworking of previous material. The melodic fragments begin to smooth out and extend, and Trigger ends with both performers working in conjunction.
credits
released May 8, 2005
Samuel Breene, violin; John Mayrose, guitar
Recorded Live May 8, 2005. Sacred Heart Church, Bloomfield, NJ
license
all rights reserved