Musical Compositions

The work Mascarade Obscure was inspired by dance rhythms of popular music from former and current centuries. By means of treatments like augmentation/diminution, permutation and modulation, these dance rhythms appear in diverse variations, forming a rhythmic texture with varying degrees of density, partly through polyphonic superpositions. In combination with instrumental noises, a musical form emerges that consists of three more animated and two contrasting calmer sections (A B A’ C A”).
I associate the sounding result with a courtly masquerade resp. with a traditional masked ball including all its imagination, sensuality and informality on the one hand and all its secretiveness and obscurity on the other hand.

1^st version:
The main idea behind the piece is the classical confrontation of a lively and humorous or gro­tesque “Scherzo” against two calm and sonorous “Trios”, resulting in the form scheme A B A’ C A”.
Trio 1 presents a timbral development from multi-coloured air sounds to distorted squeaking noises. In Trio 2, the sound lay­ers of the quintet grow more and more multi-voiced, until the soloistic, almost melodic elements of the flute (later also clarinet and bas­soon) take over power and conclude the trio in a pitched but sizzling climax. The enframing Scherzos investigate different char­ac­ters and degrees of density concerning kissing sounds.
The title refers to the fact that the musicians only play on the mouthpieces of their instruments using different preparation devices to achieve a rich timbral palette.

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