JULIAN DAY QUARTZ

FOR STRING QUARTET 2013

ABOUT Quartz samples the final ten seconds of Schubert’s unfinished Quartettsatz D.703 and slows, reverses and fragments it. The shape of the original fragment is a long wedge. The quartet grows from middle C and gradually expands across the register of the instruments. In reverse, an early loud tutti diminishes into a single quiet note: a gradual winding down. Quartz is part of an ongoing series Stammer that interrogates various musical traditions by sampling and extending key works from the canon. Stammer has evolved since the late 1990s and has found its way into works for turntables, CD players, software, electronics and live acoustic instruments. To me Stammer fuses the microscopic approach of spectralism (and La Monte Young’s notion of ‘getting inside a sound’) with the glitch aesthetics of the 1980s onwards. The Stammer approach allows one to examine existing works afresh and observe their inner workings up close. Quartz was written for Third Angle, Portland, USA, and lasts approximately 8’30. PERFORMANCE NOTES Quartz is an open score that allows for some freedom in durations. It is a single page (acting as both score and parts) with four systems:

• top system - the basic rhythmic pattern to be repeated throughout within each cell • bottom three systems - a timeline of when to play this pattern and with which notes (indicated by the two-note/chord cells)

The idea is to mimic the ‘skipping’ effect of a stuttering CD. Each player uses the rhythmic pattern to morph from one note or dyad to another, as indicated by the beamed eighth-note pairs (the ‘cells’). Where notes in a cell are identical, reiterate these pitches. The rhythmic pattern is just a guide: each bar within the pattern may be repeated ad lib. Each cell should last between 10-20 seconds but vary the length each time. Begin each cell roughly where indicated. Each dyad cell should swell to and from pianissimo, however reach and maintain the different dynamic plateaus indicated (ff, f, mf, mp, p). Ideally each performer should stand or sit apart. This could be an exaggerated arc, a straight line or another simple shape on the stage or even surrounding the audience. Such spacing will facilitate the work’s ‘broken apart’ nature and the players’ independence.

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© 2013

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