Concours International de piano d’Orléans commission Christian Mason's 'Inner Landscapes’ to be premiered at Théâtre des Bouffes-du-Nord

Concours International de piano d’Orléans commission Christian Mason's piano quintet 'Inner Landscapes’ which will see the light at the Théâtre des Bouffes-du-Nord in Paris on July 6th.

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Based on three piano pieces of the same names, these movements for piano quintet may be performed separately or as a collection, (in which case they should be played in the given order). They all have a common artistic aim: to connect musical expression with poetic inspiration. In particular, these pieces meditate on the emotional connection between our interior life and the vast and varied landscapes of the natural world all around us.

While composing I found myself re-reading Kathleen Raine (one of my favourite poets) and was struck by her statement (in the foreword to her Selected Poems): ‘Nature-poetry' is not what we write about nature, but rather the language of images in which nature daily speaks to us of the timeless, age-old mystery in which we participate. Nature communicates today what it told the earliest of humankind, and what it will tell future generations when our modern high-rise cities are no more. Meanings, moods, the whole scale of our inner experience, finds in nature the ‘correspondences' through which we may know our boundless selves. Nature is the common, universal language, understood by all."

What she says about nature resonates with my understanding of music, which also sometimes affords us an opportunity to know ‘our boundless selves'. And I am especially interested in the way that sounds - which, as vibrations in the air, are another aspect of nature - can reveal and heighten our sense of connectedness to ourselves and our surroundings.

Each movement is inspired by a single stanza from the poem "Amo Ergo Sum" by Kathleen Raine, and I would encourage anyone playing these pieces to devote time to internalising the words as well as the music, for they may contain the key to an accurate expression. As such, the relevant words are quoted at the start of each score.

Inner Landscapes is dedicated to Joe Browning, Lexy Oliver and Omar Shahryar.
(Christian Mason)

credit: Manu Theobald