Paul Frankhuijzen

Solo

One big pasture (Één grote weide)
for guitar

The piece is part from a triptych.

Part 1: One big pasture, for guitar
Part 2: By the waterside, for percussion duo
Part 3: Éventail de Mademoiselle… for alto saxophone   

The triptych forms one entity, however the components may also be performed by themselves.

The first part is the opening of the whole. There is a mediaeval thought: everything has its place in the scheme of things. I departed from the following piece of prose by Gonzalo Berceo*

I, master Gonzale de Berceo by name,
arrived, when on a pilgrimage,
at a green and grassy pasture,
where many flowers bloomed.
It was a lovely spot for a tired man.

The so fragrant flowers smelled wonderful
and refreshed a man's face and mind.
On all sides clear water flowed from rising
springs.

Here is a picture full of flowers refreshing the senses. The pasture is the holy virgin, halting place for and refresher of the traveller. The flowers are Mary's
names, and the springs are the evangelists. What is portrayed is that everything has its place in the scheme of things. And amidst all this the traveller is sitting daydreaming.

It is to be divided as follows: a pasture, many  flowers blooming, water on all sides. It opens with a free melody in a pasture. From the melody the guitarist develops more and more different actions which keep returning throughout the piece, as a theme unfolding. The guitar is retuned twice, which causes a change in resonance. The free melody in the pasture returns. The player keeps applying the same actions, but the sound is different now. The guitar becomes the spring of flowing water.

*(Gonzalo Berceo lived in the Benedictine monastery of San Millán de la Cogolla in La Rioja, Spain, in the 13e century. Text from Miraclos de Nuestra Señora)
rr
Instrumentation

017 One big pasture (Eén grote weide)
(1998 revised 2006) 
8:30’

guitar

First performance, Emiel van Dijk
Éventail de Mademoiselle…
for alto saxophone

The piece is part from a triptych.

Part 1: One big pasture, for guitar
Part 2: By the waterside, for percussion duo
Part 3: Éventail de Mademoiselle… for alto saxophone   

The triptych forms one entity, however the components may also be performed by themselves.
rr

At the 3e part the object becomes visible. A melodically pattern fans out, showing its elements. It shifts, then melts into a harmony, but continues.
The tone F is almost constantly present, as some navel cord linked to the object's fixed place.

The poem Éventail de mademoiselle… of Stéphane  Mallarmé is the inspiration. It is poetical and colourful and moves up and down as a breeze in the air. Mallarmé saw a poem  as a structure of utterd and unuttered words. To name an object is to destroy the poetical power it contains.
rr
Instrumentation

016 Éventail de Mademoiselle...
(1998)
9’

Alto saxophone

First performance, Martijne van Dijk
Painting of...
for solo instrument

The painting's are solo pieces, with the main inspiration the sound and expression of the instrument. The tonal material consists of different sound fields that move as it were, into a larger field. This is were the music plays.

Important keywords here are:

from exploring to discovering,
from resume to play,
from scanning to virtuose expression,
delicate folk influences. 
rr
Instrumentation

034 Painting for violin
(2008) 6:40'
First performance, Maria-Paula Majoor

041 Painting for guitar
(2010) 5:30’
First performance, Aart Strootman

043 Painting for cello
(2011 - revised 2020) 6.10'
First performance, Arno van der Vuurst

044 Painting for viola
(2011 - revised 2020) 4.30'
First performance, Karsten Kleijer

046 Painting for piano
(2012) 6'





© Paul Frankhuijzen| All Rights Reserved