Jeux
for string quartet and marimba (2018) | Premiere: Musicians of the Yellow Barn Young Artists Program
Jeux was premiered in the summer of 2018 in Vermont, by members of the Yellow Barn Young Artists Program.
Jeux (“games”) begins with a series of provocations and reactions, in an electric interplay between the marimba and the individual members of the string quartet. As all the instruments become involved in the game at play, the violist and cellist attempt to emerge out of the realm of the piece, and are stopped and returned by the marimba, which takes on their harmonic material and becomes increasingly prominent and soloistic. The strings follow the motives of the marimba and engage with it in canonic interplay, evolving through timbres and textures that progressively diminish in dynamic and density, until the strings lift the listener and the players out of the game and onto a cloud of buoyant energy, sustained until the sound runs out of steam, grinding to a halt.