Nodo Infinito
Nodo Infinito for 4 voices and 4 strings | 2024commissioned by and written for SoloVoices (CH) & Quartetto Maurice (IT) with the support of Sacem and Rainy Days festival in Luxembourg
Duration: 18'15'' ca.
“Nodo infinito” immerses the performers and listeners into a hypnotic loop, inspired by the buddhist symbol of "endless knot” - 9-crossing thread representing the eternal circle of time and energy where the cause and effect are one and the same.
The regularly pulsating sounds of voices and strings are constantly circling in two slightly different tempos - the pace of string players is a bit faster, meanwhile the pulse of singers is a little slower in a way that they never get synchronized like two, independently rotating planets except the very last chord of the piece.
Following my “monochrome” method, the only musical gesture used is a pure sound wave, as a simple breath in and out, letting the strings and voices become as close and as indistinguishable as possible while fusing them into a single sound body.
The macro form of the composition also follows the wave logic shaping the whole structure as two, very slow and gradual crescendos-
Written during the winter of 2024, surrounded by the wars, this piece was composed as a sort of calming meditation or a prayer for peace.
Dedicated to Quartetto Maurice and SoloVoices
1st performance: 29 November 2024, Musica in Prossimità festival, Pinerolo (IT)
Listeners reflections collected after the first performance:
"Not just a common thread but a spiritual cord that connects all musicians, singers and listeners"
"A temple in the void, a knot that will never be untied, yet at the same time a thread that binds each of us in fragile existence"
"Authentic solitude, solid and full of hope, an infinite sea with a guiding voice"
"It felt like an ancestral music, a kind of prolonged gestation in an amniotic sac where sounds arrive muffled"