A Lake Within A Lake

A Lake Within a Lake is a composition for Guzheng and spatial electronics By Cat Hope and Zihan Wang (2025) For Mindy Meng Wang The score consists of three parts – a performance score (brown background) and a spatialisation score (white background). The third part is the electronics playback. The performance score is proportional - the top of the score is the highest note, the lowest is the lowest. Thickness of the line indicates the volume – the loudest is never beyond medium loud. Do not play the photograph of the Guzheng at the start of the score. bowing. Two bows are required. soft pluck harsher pluck, with more than one string. ‘tremolo’ style – play the shape. The spatial score represents the movement and placement of sound materials in a four-quadrant vertical space.The piece can be played with the electronic part in the Decibel ScorePlayer, using the audio embedded in the score, with the ‘spatialisation’ score as a guide. Swipe up on the score to find the spatialisation score. PROGRAM NOTE This work is based on the poem ‘A Lake Within a Lake’ by Australian Indigenous poet Oodgeroo Noonucal, written in Hangzhou, China in September 1984. The poem is a reflection on Xi (west) lake in Hangzhou, but also a reflection of Noonucal’s own Aboriginal heritage and connection to the land, and the interconnectedness of different spaces and perspectives. This work proposes interconnectedness is what we need in this troubled world, and how the landscape can provide that connection. Like the poem, the piece has three main sections, three ‘sonic’ pools in the lake of spatialisation. The score derives images from a guzheng instrument gifted to Mindy Meng Wang by her first teacher; a segment of which is provided at the start of the score as a ’meditation’ for the performer. Mindy Meng Wang features in the electronics part of the score.