J. Baixas (1996) is a composer based in Barcelona.
"[A]ny text is constructed as a mosaic of quotations; any text is the absorption and transformation of another."
Julia Kristeva
J. Baixas (1996) is a composer based in Barcelona.
"[A]ny text is constructed as a mosaic of quotations; any text is the absorption and transformation of another."
With this diptych I wanted to create a forgettable piece, a piece that, after being heard, would simply be forgotten. Thus, the doubling of it: to test the listener’s memory twice.
Composició en gris [composition in grey] is written for baroque instruments and uses a complex 10-TET (10-tone equal temperament) harmonic language: such cumbersomeness to make the piece less graspable. Composició en turquesa [turquoise] is an "orchestration" of the first, a timbrally enriched version for a large set of membranophones.
Both pieces were meant to be played in the same concert: the first at the beginning, the latter at the end, encapsulating other pieces in between——therefore creating a large ABA' structure. However, this was not the case for the première: they were performed two weeks apart, but on the same day of the week, at the same hour, in the same hall, with the same context, and almost the same audience (so we could say the symmetry of the ternary form was preserved, with a middle section of 336 hours!).
Premiered on December 2nd, 2021, by Daniel García de Castro Domínguez, Marc Barrios Ferragut, Anna Espejo Fité and Julia Ramos Moreno and on December 16th, 2021, by Pau Sanuy Costa, Andreu Ferrandis Miguel, Joan Carot Martínez and Javier Delgado Pérez, respectively, at ESMUC (Escola Superior de Música de Catalunya).
Instrumentation (for C. en t.):
23 drums of different kinds: timpani - tom-toms - bass drums - tenor drums - bongos - congas - roto-toms - boobams... (or even more exotic instruments ad lib.) two crotales equally tuned (preferably in F♯)
15 wooden instruments, i.e. woodblocks - temple blocks - log drums or similar