Boosey & Hawkes (Hendon Music)
Threaded Madrigals is my attempt to capture the unique voice of the viola. There is a certain guileless melancholy to the viola's sound, which is very special to me. The title comes from early sketches for the piece, which I called madrigals. Most of these shared one particular musical aspect in common, namely the idea of moving upwards through the range of the instrument, but one very simple madrigal worked its way downwards. I realised that these ideas worked best when joined together, hence the title Threaded Madrigals. The piece does indeed gradually make its way, albeit via some twists and turns, upwards through the range, but the downward moving element (which I think of as a kind of ground bass) is there too. Both ideas are eventually distilled into two pitches, one a harmonic of the other.
—Oscar Bettison
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