Senza colori (Without Colors) (2022)

Duration: 3:00 minutes

Instrumentation: solo piano

Premiere: November 13, 2023 by Shiyu Wang at Vivian Auditorium, Whitewater Hall at Indiana University-East, Richmond, IN

Notes:

     Le cosmicomiche (Cosmicomics) is set of musical responses Italo Calvino’s collection of stories by the same name. Each story takes as its starting point a scientific fact (some of them disproven by now) and proceeds to spin out a whimsical tale with bizarre characters, all narrated by a timeless, multiform character with the improbable name of Qfwfq. Though each story begins from a strange place, and though they are often very funny, these stories speak clearly to universal themes of loss, loneliness, and yearning. To me, the very absurdity of each story’s premise makes these underlying truths more vivid.

While there are many specific connections to each story, the approach in these pieces ranges widely, from character pieces, to impressionistic and atmospheric works, to much more abstract interpretations of the ideas in the stories. These pieces may be performed individually, or as a complete set, or in subsets of the performer’s choosing.

Senza colori (Without Colors)

This story takes place in the time before the atmosphere formed. Qfwfq describes flying through the air at great speeds (“the way you could before there was air”) over a gray, monochrome landscape. He eventually sees what turns out to be his love interest, named Ayl, and they have a brief affair, which mostly involves them chasing each other. At a crucial moment, the atmosphere starts to form, and Qfwfq wants to show Ayl the beautiful bright colors that begin to appear. However, she recoils from these changes, preferring the way things used to be and finally hides under the ground where Qfwfq can't find her. This story is represented by a fleet double fugue, first with a theme for Qfwfq and later with a theme for Ayl. The two themes develop for a while together, but eventually they go in different directions, Qfwfq always up and Ayl always down. The plaintive coda represents Qfwfq’s unsuccessful search for Ayl.