Piano Trio

Piano Trio (2003)

My piano trio is a lyric work written in a single movement lasting fifteen minutes. It opens with very high harmonics and tremolandi; from these and the ideas immediately following, all the material in the piece is developed. The music is created through transformations—of melodic and rhythmic shapes, textures, characteristic harmonies. These transformations are sometimes close, sometimes remote, but the harmonies underlying the piece create a unifying resonance so that the disparate ideas cohere.

The first two thirds (ten minutes) of the work are predominantly fast, vigorous, often discontinuous, though including more reflective passages. There is a turbulent culmination, with strings high and piano in its lowest register. Quiet harmonics make a transition to the final third of the piece. This is slower and essentially melodic: flowing string lines, freely canonic, with a gentle piano accompaniment, resolve the fractured shapes and textures of before. In the coda, the music gradually ascends, dissolves and cadences.

My piano trio was written for Ian Munro and Australia Ensemble. Nicola LeFanu