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TUNING STUDIES (1997) for Yamaha Disklavier en piano samples
First performance: April,1999 in the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam
Act I : Equal temperament
Excerpts : Tuning Studies for Yamaha Disklavier, samples, and 8 speakers (1999)
Program Notes I have always been fascinated by the sounds of piano tuning and decided to write a piece based on the ritualistic character that it can create before a concert, evocative of a preludium. A good piano tuner is a musicmaker in his own right. He restores anew the raw materials used by the composer and interpreter according to the tuning of the day, laying the foundation for the realisation of their music. Every tuner has his own working rhythms combining the shifting of the hammer to a new tuning pin, playing the key to be tuned, adjusting the hammer to move the string into “the right spot”. A tuner is continually listening to the speed of beats between intervals to determine the accuracy of his work and has his own special checks and controls to engineer a harmonic balance over the keyboard. These rhythms and the melodic and harmonic materials drawn from the method of the equal temperment tuning were the basis for the musical materials in the piece . The transformation of the materials illustrate a fantasy - “the piano tuning that turned into realtime music”. I used the Yamaha Disklavier for this composition because I wanted to have the freedom to use the piano without the technical limitations of a pianist and yet employ an acoustic instrument. Because a human interpretation is never entirely possible using a computer, the slightly mechanical sound produced on the Disklavier gave a quality I was looking for - “the piano tuning that turned into realtime music”. The combination of Disklavier and piano samples grew from the idea of wanting an expanded piano sound in the concert hall. The first version of the piece was written for Yamaha Disklavier solo.
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