Monster

Notes

The word ‘Monster’ suitably describes the bass clarinet for me. I don’t mean this in a derogatory way but it can be a fierce instrument capable of growls and rasps whilst at the same time having the ability to execute more subtle and lyrical ideas. The word also makes me think of ‘Monster Movies’, not the new Hollywood blockbuster type but the old ones where you can see the strings or you know that there’s a guy in the suit (they’re my favourite). There is an improvisatory quality to this work, although it is fully notated the notation employs some ‘freer’ aspects allowing the performer to be as wild as they dare within a given framework and eventually almost leave the page altogether. Like several other pieces I have written for instruments and electronics/soundtrack the performer is pitted against warped recordings of themselves in a battle between fiction and reality.

Monster was commissioned by Paul Roe and first performed by him at Galway Arts Festival in the Summer of 2005.