This is the third in a series of Partitas [No. 1 was for 3 trombones and 3 pianos, and No. 2 (Dreamtime Suite No. 3) for bassoon and piano]. Dr. W. Howard Hoffman commissioned Partita No. 3 for violinist Oleh Krysa and his wife and partner, pianist Tatiana Tchekina.
Partita No. 3 is a five-movement work that is an expression and testimony of certain styles and forms (often related to dance); each movement strives for one general affect only (with a minimum of detours), and its style is the determining formal element. As in Partita No. 2 for bassoon and piano, this work is a result of stylistic gene splicing, full of loaned phrases; the result is a sound compost that, nevertheless, uses a very consistent language and lexicon: a structured set of scales (modes), intervalic relationships and rhythmic patterns. Another element is its Ukrainianism often covert, hiding and ready to ambush at any moment, finally coming out of the closet in the 5th movement. This Ukrainianism has been with me consistently since 1988, and I'm still not always able to shake it off.
All my Partitas have a hidden text. Yet, there is no attempt in Partita No. 3 to illustrate a story or any aspect of a story. Rather, as in Partita No. 2 and Dreamtime, there are singular elements, short phrases, sometimes images that struck me as very potent, and they became the stimuli for musical elaboration independent from the source. In other words, it is not a programmatic piece. It is a series of meditations and commentaries on key images that lingered in the mind long after the details of the story became blurred. In short, I wanted to write a piece that was essentially joyful and witty, fun to perform and listen to.
Intrada is a rhetorical monologue for violin alone. It divides into two parts: fast, but not too, and furious and slow and pensive. Here the violin is strutting its stuff. The virtuosity is idiomatic and presents few overwhelming technical hurdles. Scorrevole is a short and fast will-o'-the-wisp. The basic line is morphed through various speeds and registers as if it were some inebriated ghost passing effortlessly through objects. Duma is a lyrical interlude. Melody reigns supreme (I hope). A meditation on some melancholy event long since past. Capriccio is a crazy waltz; a miniature that suggests a music box whose spring is no longer dependable and which plays rhythmic tricks with the simple triple meter. It is also very short; the melody is first in the piano and then moves to the violin. Rondo-Hopak is technically the most challenging movement. It is also the longest. Mussorgsky made the title famous in the West. Originally, Hopak was a Ukrainian folk dance that was improvised. The name derives from hopaty: "to leap and stamp one's feet". It was at one time a dance for males only, but now the feminine element is included. Full of individual solos, complex acrobatic movements of exuberant non-stop energy, the dance is the obligatory finale to any Ukrainian dance program. It functions in the same way in this Partita. When Partita No. 3 was in the final editing stages, I received the news that the violinist Russ Cantor died. He and I spent close to 12 years making music together in Las Vegas all kinds of music. The decades of the 70s and the early 80s were years when contemporary music flourished in Las Vegas as in few other places. Russ was an important part of that period. This Partita is dedicated to his memory.