Australian Music Centre | Breaking sound barriers

Work Overview

Cicada Swells (in O ch'ae chul kut) was inspired by a chorus of bush cicadas' immersive and structured sounds during my early morning bush run through Mulgoa Nature Reserve at the foot of the Blue Mountains near Sydney. In summer, the cicada insects join together as one utterance of vibrating builds and declines of surround sound amidst suddenly penetrating moments of quiet birdsong and nature humming. In my music, altered string and cluster resonances with hints of Korean traditional samulnori percussion music rhythms with sudden interval-colour chords and birdsong-inspired motifs frame a central pond-like section. Within here, the music is static with repetitive harmonic progressions and cicada-inspired tremolo resonances over which longer birdsong simultaneously penetrates the texture high and low. There are two balanced moments of freedom as mobile sections where the pianist improvises using seed resonances and syncopated cellular ideas. The principal idea was to create a shimmer of immersive sound that communes with nature and the sustaining spirit sensed in it.

Work Details

Year: 2021

Instrumentation: Piano.

Duration: 10 min.

Difficulty: Advanced — Advanced — Complex rhythmic detail and changing colour nuances

The composer notes the following styles, genres, influences, etc in relation to this work:
Korean traditional samulnori percussion and gayageum sanjo, East coast Australian cicadas, and free jazz improvisation (Matthew Shipp Trio)

Cicada Swells (in O ch’ae chul kut) was written for Raymond Shon (piano) for his compact disc recording of twenty works by composers from the Melbourne Composers’ League.