[Monthly Sportlight 1]
TEXU KIM’s Homage to Anonymous Ancient Fiddlers
RANNVEIG SARC violin 1 BRIAN HONG violin 2
When we think of the great violinists throughout history, we think Paganini, Heifetz. Today’s great artists like Hilary Hahn or Gil Shaham. In this piece, composer Texu Kim pays tribute to not only the legendary virtuosos, but to “those anonymous ancient fiddlers...their impressive skills and their endeavor to acquire them.” Listen closely for the hockets, detuning effects, and triple/quadruple stops - a hat trick of tributes to pre-Baroque artists whose legacy is the modern violin.
OFFICIAL MUSIC VIDEO
OFFICIAL MUSIC VIDEO (B-side)
Interview with TEXU KIM, composer
[Program Note by the composer]
Homage to Anonymous Ancient Fiddlers (2015)
Entertainment has been one of the most significant functions of music and virtuosity is one of the keys to that. One may recall some representative examples such as Paganini and Liszt, but I believe that there have been many more unknown heroes in music history. This piece, as the title attempts to show, is about the anonymous ancient fiddlers – their impressive skills and their endeavor to acquire them. This piece has numerous virtuosic variations of a simple imaginary ancient melody. In order to add some more ‘ancient flavor’ and to make the piece more virtuosic, I incorporated several techniques such as hockets (distributed melody between two players), triple and quadruple stops, and detuning effect, all of which are from pre-Baroque era.
Note: before playing the piece, violin 2 needs to be tuned slightly lower (about a quarter tone) than violin 1. It should be done on the stage so that the audience can understand the out-of-tune effect is intended. To do so, violin 1 should tune first and then play a note between G# and A – roughly a sixth tone below A would work the best.
Interview with RANNVEIG MARTA SARC, violin
Interview with BRIAN HONG, violin