Transcribing Here and Now With Watchers by Lucia Dlugoszewski
Again at work on one of Lucia Dlugoszewski’s seminal pieces for timbre-piano, Here and Now with Watchers.
An evening-length piece written for the dance of Erick Hawkins and his new-born dance company, it was the result of a joined creative effort lasting years. The complexity and beauty of the piece, premiered in 1957, also represent many strong aesthetic and philosophical principles that Dlugoszewski and Hawkins developed in the following years, in each own field of art.
Dlugoszewski also took the occasion to formalize some important statements about music and the nature of timbre-piano.
The composition was created in close conjunction with dance, but ready to be standing alone (she performed it as a concert piece with the title “Archaic Timbre Piano Music”).
I concentrated my efforts on three sections of the piece. As usual, there is not a proper score: Dlugoszewski wrote for her own performances, and her notation – when existing – is not at all exhaustive for a performer.
This time I had the help of a precious folder kept at Library of Congress, Washington DC, with many notated pages clearly referable to one of the sections of “Here and Now”, tough in mixed order and probably coming from different times in composition and revision. There are even a handful of pages in nice copy, providing precious notational elements.
Still, this useful but scattered material is not enough. For my transcription I used as a main source one video of the 60ies with Hawkins performing the dance and Dlugoszewski the music, cross-checking sound and movement with the dance score. As I learned in “Cantilever” music, counting is mandatory in case of Dlugoszewski/Hawkins compositions! Constant discussion with Katherine Duke, director of the Hawkins Dance Company, followed the progression of the work.
Comparing these different materials had been very interesting to gather further information on the process of creation and eventually notation of the music; I have the feeling of an improved knowledge of Dlugoszewski’s musical world. I guess, as with the other pieces, that the destiny of this transcription will be to be revised several times, at least one for each future performance.
But for now the next task is to make the music of “Here and Now” alive again, ready in some weeks!
Tag on Lucia Dlugoszewski
