(Host) This Friday evening at the UVM recital hall, the Lane Series presents the Bowed Piano Ensemble. VPR Classical host Joe Goetz is a former member of the ensemble, and profiled its director and the unusual approach to piano.
(Sound of Bowed Piano]
(Goetz) Believe it or not, what you’re hearing is a piano, only it’s not being played on the keyboard. The Bowed Piano Ensemble is a group of ten musicians who strike, pluck, and bow the strings of one concert grand piano.
It’s the brainchild of Colorado College music professor and composer Stephen Scott.
Scott grew up in Oregon, the son of two musical scientists, and a lover of jazz.
(Scott) "I had a friend who was a drummer, who had an entire basement of his house to himself and it was like his own apartment, and this was in high school. And he kept his drum set there and we’d often jam there. And he had a good stereo system so we’d listen to the latest Miles and ‘Trane recordings, and so on."
(Goetz) Scott cultivated his love of music and turned it into degrees in composition from the University of Oregon and Brown University.
After completing his studies, he spent the summer of 1970 in West Africa studying polyrhythmic drumming. There he met Steve Reich, the American minimalist composer — and Vermont resident — who had a profound impact on Scott’s work.
(Scott) "We had for several years a fairly good sort of creative relationship, so we kept in touch and he was a big influence on me."
(Goetz) In 1976, Scott was back in the States and in charge of the Colorado College New Music Ensemble. That same year, he attended a concert by composer Curtis Curtis-Smith. And it made an immediate impact.
(Scott) "He had the keyboard reach into the piano and draw nylon fish line under strings and had individual pitches like that. And it was a really captivating sound, and even during the concert, I started imagining what this would be like with 8 or 10 players playing different notes and creating different and huge complex chords."
(Goetz) A year later, Scott and the ensemble premiered "Music One for Bowed Strings," a piece that is relatively simple compared to some of Scott’s more recent exploits. In the decades since, Scott’s compositions have become have become more symphonic, and technically more difficult to perform.
Friday’s concert at UVM features a performance of what Scott refers to as his magnum opus — called "Vikings of the Sunrise." It tells the story of early Polynesian navigators who criss-crossed the Pacific using celestial navigation. Scott uses a wide range of sounds and techniques to play the bowed piano on the grandest scale.
The music for bowed piano by Stephen Scott is challenging, yet accessible. Rather than a whole orchestra of musicians each playing their own instrument, Scott’s compositions push the performers to create an orchestral sound by playing different parts of the same instrument. The effect is unique among modern composers.
For VPR News, I’m Joe Goetz.
Note: The Bowed Piano Ensemble performs Friday night at 7:30 at the UVM recital hall. Joe will give a pre-concert talk with UVM music professor Wayne Schneider at 6:30.