Website: https://stuartmacrae.com
Verlag: Novello & Co, London
Bemerkung: Stuart MacRae: The original idea for the structure of the piece comes from an exhibit in the Musée Matisse in Nice, which I visited a few months before beginning to write. The item in question was a copy of Parsifaé: Chant de Minos, a book of aphorisms by Henri de Motherlant for which Matisse provided illustrations. The book was presented in the form of a number of pictorial ‘variations’ on the written aphorisms. I was also impressed by the sensitive quality of Matisse’s ‘nature morte’ (still life) paintings (the paradoxical translation also appeals to me…) and the wonderful faux-naïf humour in many of his portraits. https://www.wisemusicclassical.com/work/11952/Piano-Quintet--Stuart-MacRae/.
Verlag: Novello & Co, London
Bemerkung: Stuart MacRae: While I was beginning to think about some of the ideas for this piece, a gift I received of a book on the American painter Mark Rothko renewed a fascination with his work which I had had since I first saw some of his paintings a few years ago. I also had the opportunity, while working on the piece, to visit the large retrospective of his canvases at the Musee d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris…. My initial intention for this piece was for the music to aspire to the condition of Rothko. However, this would have been a pointless and self-defeating aim, as ultimately a piece of music must be directed through time and thus takes on its own meaning and its own life. Furthermore, the music must have meaning in of itself, and not be dependent on a listener's awareness of its subject or intentions. And lastly, the great variety of moods and visions expressed in the selection of Rothkos I saw eclipsed any notion that "the condition of Rothko" could validly be summed up or represented. Therefore, I would say that my piece Portrait is a tribute to Rothko - neither a portrait of him, nor of his ideas, but a "portrait of an idea" in Rothko's words - that which expresses in an elemental, abstract and forceful way the vision which inspired it. https://www.wisemusicclassical.com/work/11117/Portrait--Stuart-MacRae/.
Verlag: Novello & Co, London
Bemerkung: Stuart MacRae (2000): …the main principle of the piece: that of the containment of different strands of material within one framework. Again borrowing from Rothko's ideas, the materials within the work develop along their own lines as "characters in an abstract drama", but can never actually leave the context of the work to which they belong. https://www.wisemusicclassical.com/work/12457/Portrait-II--Stuart-MacRae/.
Verlag: Novello & Co, London
Bemerkung: Stuart MacRae (1997): The title comes from a line in the George Mackay Brown short story, Witch, in which a young girl is tortured, humiliated and burned in suspicion of heresy. There is, however, no connection between the music and this story other than that I was moved by while writing the piece. Another association was when I first encountered the work of the sculptor Barbara Hepworth who, for a period, only made her beautiful and simple forms out of two pieces of stone. Although my initial intention was to follow this example, the music outgrew this structure (but the spirit of Hepworth's idea of beauty through simplicity and balance remains) and the work as it stands has four movements. https://www.wisemusicclassical.com/work/8128/The-Witchs-Kiss--Stuart-MacRae/.
This work is licensed under CC BY 4.0 Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
ao. Univ.-Prof. Dr. Monika Fink-Naumann
monika.fink@uibk.ac.at
Institut für Musikwissenschaft / Department of Musicology
Universität Innsbruck / University of Innsbruck
Haus der Musik
Universitätsstraße 1
A - 6020 Innsbruck