Una Cicala Innamorata (1999)
il pandemonio in arcadia  

fl, ob, cl, cl-bas, mand, gtr, harp, pno, perc-2, vl, vla, cel, bass
Duration: approx.11:30

first performance:  September 1999 in the Gaudeamus Week by the Nieuw Ensemble, conductor, Micha Hamel

revision first performance:  June 1999  Musik Factory Festival  Bergen, Norway by Ensemble Insomnio, conducted by Josep Vicente

Program Notes

The musical and visual imagery behind una Cicala innamorata  were conceived listening to the sounds in a summer field in Akiyoshidai, Japan.  The perfect orchestration of rhythm, tone color and melodic motive was disturbed only by the listener.

This soundscape evoked echoes of Arcadia, the pastoral paradise of escape and (oft unconsummated) desire, conceived and recreated throughout European art history.

The god Pan is a central figure in Arcadia spending his time chasing after nymphs, playing his pipes and lording it over shepherds, driving them to bouts of pandemonium from time to time.

The piece was originally written voor the Nieuw Ensemble, whose instrumentation seemed ideal for making music of this subject. 
The revised version was written for Insomnio Ensemble.

The scene is set in a static ambience out of which small episodes of interaction follow between various combinations of instruments, using two melodic modes in a free manner.  

The rhythmic material draws insect sounds heard in Akiyoshidai as well as using various numeric relations in symmetrical mathematical squares.