Musica Segreta, composed in 2006, is a revision of
Quartet originally composed in 1996. The work makes use of a hexachord, extracted from the seven-note set found in Boulez's
'...explosante-fixe...' which was written to the memory of Igor Stravinsky. This symmetrical hexachord defines two tonal regions: A proceeding to E-flat. In order to help myself expand the tonal possibilities for the work, I created a three-dimensional cube. On each surface I wrote out three sets of pairings of the hexachord starting on A, C, and C-sharp. The eight corners of the cube suggested a collection eight principal sonorities, heard in the piano at the beginning. By rotating the cube, I was able to create many of the linear and vertical pitch collections. The idea of Stravinsky's
rotations is very much evident.
Finally, I take Gesualdo's Beltà, poi che t'assenti from his collection of Madrigals, Book VI (which, incidentally, appears as the third movement of Stravinsky's Monumentum pro Gesualdo, 1960), re-voice the first phrase and place it in the strings at the coda, above a piano ostinato. This phrase also moves from A to E-flat, creating a connection with the Boulez hexachord.
This work was written for a concert in honor of Glenn Watkins upon his retirement from the University of Michigan in 1996 (revised in 2006), and dedicated to him. He is the author of Gesualdo: The man and his music, for which Stravinsky wrote the preface. Hence the quartet of characters: Boulez, Stravinsky, Gesualdo, and Watkins.
