Mystery of constellation: concerto for guitar and chamber orchestra

Unrestricted Mystery of Constellation is a three-movement work for solo guitar and chamber orchestra. The orchestra is scored for a small string section and five winds: flute (doubling on alto flute), oboe (doubling on English horn), Bb clarinet (doubling on bass clarinet), bassoon, and horn.; A chief concern when writing a guitar concerto is the issue of balance between the soloist and the orchestra. My solution to this was to frequently create a registral space in the orchestra in which the guitar can reside alone, and therefore be more easily heard. Although there are a few sections where the guitarist plays alone, the orchestra frequently plays with the soloist.; The harmonic and melodic language of the piece is derived partly from the natural resonance of the guitar. A quartal-sounding four-note cell (0257) frequently exerts its presence throughout the piece, both at a surface and structural level. Lastly, I often created pitch collections that are “octave-specific.” C natural, for example, may be present in the collection below D4, but in higher octaves C is actually sharp, creating a conflict with the C naturals found in lower octaves. The use of “non-octaving” scales provided a means of creating a specific sound world that seemed appropriate for this piece.; The first movement, “Heliacal Rising,” is a brash, often loud, nervous exposition. A short, jabbing two-note motive in the orchestra alternates with more contemplative arpeggios in the guitar part. The brief second movement, “Scanning the Black Dome,” utilizes the “pizzicato” playing technique on the guitar, which involves muting the string with the pad of the player’s right thumb. The orchestral writing is quite sparse, with the exception of two brief ecstatic, celebratory sections. A poem titled “Hypotheses” by John Terpstra provided a fruitful mental image as I composed this movement. The final movement, “Astrolabe,” offers the guitarist an opportunity to display his or her virtuosity. The string writing in the orchestra is equally demanding. The underlying harmonic motion is quite slow, indeed static at times. The surface motion, however, is often very fast. Much of the music that the late-Baroque period left us, particularly Vivaldi’s, provided a point of reference for me to draw from.