Sonata for Solo Cello

Program Note

Bach’s solo suites are the lingua franca of the cello repertoire. To a composer writing for unaccompanied cello, they loom as an unattainable but inescapable ideal; I wanted (as Brahms said of Bach) to “write a whole world on a single staff”. My immediate inspiration, though, was more particular and physical: the instrument’s musical geometry. Thinking about the tuning of the strings, the location of their harmonic nodes, the way the hand lies on the fingerboard, I looked for unexplored possibilities, ways of making music that would be cellistic yet novel—an audacious ambition, given the instrument’s rich history, but creatively stimulating even when it eluded me.

The Prelude alternates between a broad majestic theme and hushed episodes in natural harmonics, the flute-like, ghostly overtones that result from touching the string lightly at specific points, called nodes, along its length. The movement is in double-stops (two-note chords) throughout; in the harmonics sections, this requires transcendental precision as the cellist elicits different overtones (e.g. the 3rd and 6th partials) on adjacent strings simultaneously. This limits the chord possibilities to harmonics that lie within a handspan of each other, revealing in sound an uncharted aspect of the cello’s tonal architecture. For all that, the result is heartfelt: the listener can ignore the underlying technical concerns in favor of the emotive designs on the surface.

The Corrente, which is plucked throughout, extends traditional pizzicato technique with guitar-like hammer-ons and pull-offs, sounds made as the fingers of the left hand slap down on a string or half-pluck it on release. The intimate Notturno at the heart of the sonata, while evocative, springs likewise from a technical idea. The plaintive sighs of the opening are an acoustic trompe-l’oeil: each two-note gesture consists of a harmonic overtone followed by an “ordinary” fingered pitch; the resulting tones span a wide interval in sound (a ninth, a thirteenth) yet lie close together on the string (separated by just a half step). A slight catch in the tone as the string shifts from the harmonic to the normal mode of vibration adds to the pathos. A wistful, songlike Saraband follows, leading to the virtuosic final Gigue. The sonata ends as the energetic Gigue rhythm melds into the majestic theme of the Prelude in a glorious synthesis.