cindy mctee

CIRCLE MUSIC I-IV

1988
6-8 minutes

instrumentation

score & audio examples

commercial recording

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program notes

Circle Music is indeterminate with respect to form, requiring the performers to make spontaneous decisions as to which of approximately 15 musical fragments will be heard at any given moment. The order of events and the resulting relationships between the two parts are therefore different each time the piece is performed.  Continuity is achieved by occasional imitation between the parts as well as the consistent use of the octatonic scale (C, C#, D#, E, F#, G, A, Bb) and a recurring C-major triad in the base register of the piano.

press/reviews

Cindy McTee's "Circle Music IV," for horn and piano, is a thought-provoking piece centered on the soothing sonority of an ever-present major chord, over which dissonances freely surface.