Passé composé (1992)
(Pianorhapsody)

From the French grammar by Maurice Grevisse: The passé composé describes an action that was performed in a definite or indefinite past and that is considered in relation to the present. This action may have taken place in a period of time that has not yet been completed or its consequences may still have to be taken into account in the present. On the one hand, the indefinite past represents the end point of a sequence of events or the resulting temporal sequence in the present; on the other hand, it brings successive moments back into relation with the past.

In this piano composition, I was given the opportunity to realize the idea of this tense: In the last bar, the performer switches on a playback device unnoticed by remote control, which is hidden inside the piano or behind it. While the pianist freezes in this position immediately after striking the last chord until it fades out, a previously heard, quiet section of the piece can be heard from the sound recording. An electro-acoustic apparatus with separate amplification and loudspeakers of excellent quality should be dispensed with. It is precisely the imperfect sound of the built-in loudspeaker of a cassette recorder or similar sound carrier that will best correspond to the atmosphere of an indeterminate past.

Passé composé, a piece of musical reflection on the rhapsodic labyrinths of memory, was premiered by its commissioner, the Belgian pianist Luk Vaes, at the Salzburg Mozarteum in the summer of 1994.

M.K.
(Translation by Edition Peters)