EVERYTHING STARTS FROM A DOT - Kit Turnbull

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Commissioned by, and dedicated to Dr. Matthew J. George and the University of St. Thomas Symphonic Wind Ensemble, St. Paul, Minnesota, USA.

 

First performed Sunday, October 16, 2016 at the O' Shaughnessy Auditorium, St. Catherine University.

 

The title of the piece is a quote from the Russian painter, Wassily Kandinsky (1866 – 1944). Kandinsky’s entire artistic and teaching philosophy was underpinned by his belief that music and painting were inextricably linked as art forms. He spoke of the “inner sound of colour” (synaesthesia), and wrote extensively on the subject of colour and shape (particularly geometrical elements) in abstract art, going on to become a leading figure in the Bauhaus movement.

 

Each movement of the piece is subtitled with the title of a Kandinsky painting. I have not attempted to reproduce these paintings musically, rather use them as a starting point for my musical ideas.

 

I – Staccato Dances

On The Points – 1928

 

Painted in the same year in which Kandinsky completed his text, ‘Point and Line to Plane’, I saw this painting as a tight grouping of geometric shapes balancing on points, seemingly teetering on the brink of falling, as they vie for the same space on the horizontal surface.

 

II – Lighter-than-air

Sky Blue – 1940

 

As his career went on, Kandinsky became more concerned with the depiction of biomorphic shapes. In Sky Blue, these figures (that you might almost call creatures) emerge from the blue background that resembles the sky, floating in seemingly random patterns.

 

III – Capricious

Violet Wedge - 1919

 

Painted during his return to Russia, this picture contains a mass of Kandinsky’s trademark lines and squiggles intertwined on a 

vibrant background, and in the top right corner, the eye is constantly drawn back to the violet wedge.

Piccolo

2 Flutes

Oboe

Cor Anglais

2 1st B flat Clarinets

2 2nd B flat Clarinets

2 3rd B flat Clarinets

B flat Bass Clarinet

2 Bassoons

B flat Soprano Saxophone

E flat Alto Saxophone

B flat Tenor Saxophone

E flat Baritone Saxophone

4 B flat Trumpets

4 F Horns

3 Trombones (3rd Bass)

Euphonium

2 Tubas

Double Bass

Timpani

4 Percussion

C. 12 minutes