The work’s title is derived from two Greek words: πτερόν, “feather” and πέτρος, “stone.” The title is an allegoric definition of the type of timbre and texture of this composition. On one hand, a bird’s feather, symbolising something light and aerial, as well as a jagged shape. On the other hand, its opposite: something heavy, multiform, either rough and porous or smooth, with an even surface. The work revolves around those characteristics: irregularity, wryness, jaggedness, roughness, and straggliness. The title’s antinomy reflects the formal course of the composition, which oscillates between lightness and delicacy on one hand and heaviness and mass on the other.

Paweł Hendrich