- Stuart MacRae
Three Pictures (2005)
- Novello & Co Ltd (World)
- 2(pic:afl)2(ca)2(Ebcl:bcl)2(cbn)/2200/timp.perc/str[8.6.4.4.2]
- 21 min
Programme Note
The title of this piece does not refer to pictures in the real sense, but to imaginary or mental pictures. The first two pieces explore the same conceptual image from opposing perspectives: one looking at events or objects of great activity or detail as if from a great distance; the other looking at similar events/objects from within. The first perspective has the implication of slowness, and the eternal; the second of constant, fizzing change and the ephemeral. I had, in particular, images from nature in mind, such as the constant yet infinitely changeable shapes of the sea, or of trees, or of fields of grass blown by the wind.
The remaining piece is more programmatic – albeit impressionistically – and is based on an astonishingly vivid description of a (possibly imaginary) painting from Solzhenitsyn’s novel The First Circle.
© 2005 Stuart MacRae
The remaining piece is more programmatic – albeit impressionistically – and is based on an astonishingly vivid description of a (possibly imaginary) painting from Solzhenitsyn’s novel The First Circle.
© 2005 Stuart MacRae
Scores
Reviews
Nothing rouses the curiosity of the music world so much as a young composer who unselfconsciously shows a mastery of traditional skills while speaking with a voice of his own. So it is with Stuart MacRae, the precocious Scot with a growing international reputation. His Three Pictures, premiered at the weekend by the Scottish Chamber Orchestra under Oliver Knussen ... confirms him as an original craftsman and deft communicator.
In its evocation of atmosphere the new piece sounds like an abstract contemporary version of La Mer: MacRae's images are also symphonic sketches, quasi-impressionist in execution, abstract in tone and sombre in mood. But the syntax, full of open-ended statements and pregnant pauses, is more Messiaen than Debussy, its half-lights filtered through moody woodwind solos, muted trumpets and sighing bass glissandos. There's not much dynamism or development: MacRae is a master of his own timeframe, proceeding from eerie stasis in the first picture to a mosaic of darting figures in the second, before a quizzical finale.
In its evocation of atmosphere the new piece sounds like an abstract contemporary version of La Mer: MacRae's images are also symphonic sketches, quasi-impressionist in execution, abstract in tone and sombre in mood. But the syntax, full of open-ended statements and pregnant pauses, is more Messiaen than Debussy, its half-lights filtered through moody woodwind solos, muted trumpets and sighing bass glissandos. There's not much dynamism or development: MacRae is a master of his own timeframe, proceeding from eerie stasis in the first picture to a mosaic of darting figures in the second, before a quizzical finale.
11th May 2005
MacRae's Three Pictures was the premiere in the concert, and showed again what a huge talent he is. The first two of these pieces, one all sombre, slow-moving lines punctuated by staccato chords, the second exploding the same gestures into a much more nervy and extrovert orchestral landscape, are thoroughly convincing in a Bergian sort of way.
9th May 2005