Mirror Games for piano trio

Описание: A new composition for piano, violin and cello.

“Mirror Games” came about when I was thinking about symmetrical harmony. Imagine a vertical mirror placed parallel with the central key of the piano. Picture the pianist’s right hand playing, and its reflection in the mirror. When the right hand goes up, the “left hand reflection” goes down, and vice versa. I constructed a series of chordal structures based around symmetrical harmonies “mirroring” around a central interval, often a perfect fifth, because that way the mirror point could be the open string harmonics of the violin and cello.

The piece (about 15 minutes) is cast in three main sections: 1. A slow, quiet opening which moves into a much more animated, episodic section. 2. A very still passage when the piano plays “mirror notes” above and below a symmetrical 4 part string “chorale” (of sorts), and, 3. A reversal of the opening section, as if reflected in a mirror. This “mirror reflection” is done in a very playful way, the gestural structure of the first 6 minutes of the piece is reversed, a lot of the melodies reappear backwards or are inverted (as if in a sideways mirror) and the piece returns to a “back to front” reiteration of the harmonic sequence of the opening. Mirrors and Games…