Honeyreves

Like Vivaldi and Lotti, Bruno Maderna (1920-73) was one of the most important composers born in Venice. And also like Vivaldi, Maderna showed prodigious ability on the violin from a young age. After various conservatory experiences, he eventually gravitated toward composition and began teaching at the Venice Conservatory. His interests centered on twelve-tone and serial techniques; serialism involves the careful control of numerous musical parameters, each of which can be assigned a number and then utilized according to some pre-conceived numerical sequence. Maderna was an influential member of the so-called Darmstadt School in West Germany. At Darmstadt he met flautist Severino Gazzelloni, for whom he composed several flute works involving extended, novel techniques. In its brief five minutes, Honeyreves (1961) explores new ways to get sound from the flute and the piano. The former lingers over angular gestures across its range and ample flutter tonguing, while the piano is treated as a percussion instrument, involving chord clusters and manipulation inside the piano lid.

(c) Jason Stell