Australian Music Centre | Breaking sound barriers

Work Overview

Like This begins with a chant of a tonic and its major neighbor-tones, common to many peoples I believe, though I have heard it as a Maori chant from New Zealand in a workshop that I attended in 1998, and I have also heard it in Qawwali music. This chant forms the rhythmical basis of the piece. The various melodies vary between the Mixolydian and the dominant Lydian scales which I have heard often in both Indian Raga and Sufi Qawwali. The glissandi and portamento treatment of melodic lines imitates the vocal slides of the singers in these musics. Sections of this piece feature different styles of writing, including varied, but somewhat typical Western choral approaches and orchestral accompaniments. My love of pan-diatonic harmony is exposed by the massed chords in both the choir and ensemble as well as the approximated sitarish use of the strings brushed inside the piano after weighting the keys of the appropriate scale. Before the piece can move forward to the ending, a fortissimo chant is re-introduced harking back to the first movement's opening.

Underlying this work is the feeling that this music combines not only styles but distinct genre messages. This is accomplished through the inclusion of style and genre elements from Persian, Arabic, and Hindu vocal and classical music and through the use of recognisable Western Classical choral and orchestral treatments.

Work Details

Year: 2009

Instrumentation: SATB choir.

Duration: 8 min.

Difficulty: Advanced

Commission note: Commissioned by St Peter's Lutheran College, Graeme Morton.

A cappella version from 3rd section of Cantillations