About half an hour’s journey north from the village of Hâsbeiya, in the mountain cluster called Mount Hermon, near the border between Israel, Lebanon, and Syria, we can find a pool. This is the third source of the river Jordan—the one situated at the highest altitude and frequently omitted in geographic accounts.
The idea of writing a piece somehow related to the sphere of the sacrum, but characterised by reduced emotional expression, depletion and indeterminacy—originated in the young composer’s private conversation with Mark Andre, whom he met at the Warsaw Autumn in 2012. About half an hour’s journey north from the village of Hâsbeiya, in the mountain cluster called Mount Hermon, near the border between Israel, Lebanon, and Syria, we can find a pool. This is the third source of the river Jordan—the one situated at the highest altitude and frequently omitted in geographic accounts. The idea of writing a piece somehow related to the sphere of the sacrum, but characterised by reduced emotional expression, depletion and indeterminacy—originated in the young composer’s private conversation with Mark Andre, whom he met at the Warsaw Autumn in 2012.
The form—strongly constructivist, as in most of Strzelec’s works— consists of three separately composed segments, which were later superimposed so that each of them meets the next one at the point of its own golden section and the symmetrically reflected golden section of the next segment. The harmonic material is based on three spectra and cepstra (inverse spectra) of the base tones: B flat (14.565 Hz and 29,829 Hz), F (21.825 Hz and 22,348 Hz) and C (32.7 Hz and 33,484 Hz). Between the segments, in the overlapping fragments of the chain, the composer applies spectral modulations (by passing through the intersection of the sets of harmonics corresponding to the base tones of the overlapping segments). The central, “proper” segment is a harmonic cadence built of chords of varying density (which reflects the proportions of the overall form). The chords are constructed alternately of elements of the harmonic spectra and inverse spectra of the tone F. In order to achieve an effect of disorientation by blurring the harmonic tendencies and directions (by making them ambiguous)—the beginning of a sequence is usually presented in opposition to the standard logic of a chord, i.e. as the bottom part of the subharmonic (undertone) series and the top part of the harmonic (overtone) series. By combining microintervallic harmonies and strict structuring with a wide array of extended techniques, the composition becomes an organically geometrical sound sculpture, trembling like the surface of the water and submitted to mirror transformations. The composition, written in his second year of studies, was this artist’s first attempt at a systematic, simultaneous combination of temporal, harmonic, and textural forms of organisation. The form—strongly constructivist, as in most of Strzelec’s works— consists of three separately composed segments, which were later superimposed so that each of them meets the next one at the point of its own golden section and the symmetrically reflected golden section of the next segment. The harmonic material is based on three spectra and cepstra (inverse spectra) of the base tones: B flat (14.565 Hz and 29,829 Hz), F (21.825 Hz and 22,348 Hz) and C (32.7 Hz and 33,484 Hz). Between the segments, in the overlapping fragments of the chain, the composer applies spectral modulations (by passing through the intersection of the sets of harmonics corresponding to the base tones of the overlapping segments). The central, “proper” segment is a harmonic cadence built of chords of varying density (which reflects the proportions of the overall form). The chords are constructed alternately of elements of the harmonic spectra and inverse spectra of the tone F. In order to achieve an effect of disorientation by blurring the harmonic tendencies and directions (by making them ambiguous)—the beginning of a sequence is usually presented in opposition to the standard logic of a chord, i.e. as the bottom part of the subharmonic (undertone) series and the top part of the harmonic (overtone) series. By combining microintervallic harmonies and strict structuring with a wide array of extended techniques, the composition becomes an organically geometrical sound sculpture, trembling like the surface of the water and submitted to mirror transformations. The composition, written in his second year of studies, was this artist’s first attempt at a systematic, simultaneous combination of temporal, harmonic, and textural forms of organisation.