2 mins
A mat ter of life and death
PREMIERE of the MONTH
CELLOS OF THE WORLD UNITE: Cellists from around the world performed a special arrangement of the Ukrainian national anthem on 24 April, for a project organised by online resource The Cello Museum. The project was inspired by Pablo Casals’ famous quote ‘The cello is my only weapon’ and the memory of Rostropovich playing Bach to celebrate the fall of the Berlin Wall. A total of 225 cellists, amateur and professional, responded to the call for participants, with 146 featured in the end. The full video can be viewed at bit.ly/3knCInb. Image: courtesy The Cello Museum
COMPOSER Bushra El-Turk
WORK Painting Secrets
ARTISTS Adelphi Quartet
DATE 21 June 2022
PLACE Aldeburgh Church, Aldeburgh, UK bit.ly/3k2cRRE
Bushra El-Turk
Adelphi Quartet
ADELPHI PHOTO KAUPO KIKKAS. EL-TURK PHOTO BEN MCDONALD
Programmed alongside its ‘sister piece’ Saffron Dusk, British composer Bushra El-Turk’s new commission Painting Secrets for the Adelphi Quartet explores new life, as opposed to Saffron Dusk’s look at death. More specifically, the new work, commissioned by the Aldeburgh Festival and Britten Pears Arts, is based on El-Turk’s own experience of giving birth:
‘I’m questioning the pain one goes through when there is new life, as well as death.’ Breathing and sighing will be integrated into the work’s musical phrases, intertwined with the instrumental parts. ‘I don’t see the instrument as being separate to the person playing it. I see vocalisations as a continuation from the bow stroke.’
El-Turk has implemented her own five-step ‘spectrum’ of improvisation. ‘You start off with an idea, on which the performer develops and elaborates,’ she says. The spectrum is as follows: play the beginning material as written; then play it again with idiomatic decoration; improvise based on the given material; improvise based on the spirit of the given material; improvise freely. Parameters, based on an Arabic style of improvisation and modes, are given to guide the performers. ‘It puts less importance on the “holy” score,’ she says. ‘The right people can express that musical line better than anything I could have written.’
Having composed for the Adelphi Quartet before, El-Turk had a fresh chance to work with them on this commission: ‘I got to know them better through the improvisation I set them and how they approach musical ideas. They have so much depth and chemistry, and it brings out the best in the piece.’ Of the premiere she says, ‘The creative response to my material will be interesting. I don’t care if they play “incorrectly”, as long as they don’t lose the blood that runs through the work’s veins.’