Slow Smoke (2023)
for string quartet and clarinet in A [11:00]
SCORE at COMPOSERS EDITION
During a trip to Varanasi in December 2022, I discovered this title in a book by Geoff Dyer: a partial description of the city in which I found myself:
Late afternoon. Flames in sunlight, by the river. Slow Smoke. People drifting through the smoke, moving in sunlight.
Strolling on the ghats, or from a wooden boat, on sees hazy shapes, wrapped in a mix of fog and smokes that occasionally thins to reveal a glimpse of a giant living fresco along the quays of the Ganges.
Slow Smoke was inspired by the Hindustani tradition, and the sonority of the harmonium in particular, here evoked by the clarinet which plays modal figures from start to finish: a soloistic melody, almost improvisatory, that tries to explore the multiple possible pathways of a single persistent mode. The quartet grounds it with a drone, often on (retuned) open strings, that also wanders between four pivot notes (G – F – D – C#), which in turn provoke transpositions and alterations. Anchored in this modal vocabulary, the piece unfurls steadily, an Alap that builds itself at a slow and steady pace.
Slow Smoke was commisioned by Grand Théâtre de Provence – Festival Nouveaux Horizons – Aix-en-Provence, with support from the Fondation Francis et Mica Salabert. It was premiered on 10 November 2023 in Aix-en-Provence.