Fennessy - gut, hair, skin, air for timpani, violin, viola, violoncello and electronics

What happens in that instant just as the skin is stroked or when the bow makes contact with the string? Where does the impulse come from to produce a sound and how does it feel when it comes?

I realised a while ago that when listening to music I’m drawn towards a narrative but not necessarily the type which starts at the beginning and tells a story through to the end.

For me music has a unique ability to follow a kind of emotional narrative that finds a tiny crack; a split second in time; an instant and sinks further and further into itself – where time seems to seep out from the centre in all directions. In this way, the shape of the music acts as a kind of ‘freeze frame’, looking continuously at the same moment but always zooming in to higher degrees of magnification so that what can appear to be, for instance, a smooth edge can also be revealed to have the most intricate topography.

On an emotional level this can mean languishing for en extended period in an impulse - riding on the back of a motor neuron as it makes its way up the spine, standing on the ridge of a fingerprint a mile across or gliding on the gentlest breath as it escapes from the lips.

Music can somehow simultaneously describe everything leading up to the moment and the moment itself. For me the motivation to make a sound and the manner in which it is executed are very important when choosing which notes come next. By focusing on these aspects the smallest gesture becomes heightened and often it is the simplest musical element – an open string or a steady pulse - that can reveal endless intricacies.

David Fennessy