« Mystery of a landscape»

Composer : Edith Lejet
Composition : 2016
Duration : around 12’ 30’’
Nomenclature : solo violin and ensemble of 16 musicians : 1 flute, 1 oboe, 1 B-flat clarinet, 1 bassoon, 1 horn in F, 1 tenor-bass trombone, percussion (2 instrumentalists), 1 harp, 2 violins, 2 violas, 2 cellos, 1 double bass.
Commentary :

Is it a true landscape that one is contemplating, or a work of art, a painting? It is ambiguous.

In reality, any landscape offers only an ephemeral appearance. Because it is exposed to meteorological phenomena, to the alternation of day and night, and to the rhythm of the four seasons, its image is in perpetual evolution, always different.
The same landscape can be looked at differently when a genuine and visionary artist is gazing at it. Whether he is a painter or a poet, this talented human being, after an initiation and a long and hard technical learning, will have acquired the ability to durably make fixed a timeless image in all its beauty and strength.

Marked with his imprint, the landscape thus transcended will be endowed with unsuspected virtues because its author, to realize it, will have penetrated at the very heart of Life.
« Mystery of a Landscape », a one-movement musical composition that appears as a fresco, is a meditation on the mysterious powers of art and the role of the creative artist. Related to one of the "Nouvelles Orientales" ("How Wang Fô was saved") by the Franco-American poetess Marguerite Yourcenar, this musical piece, a kind of concerto for violin and instrumental ensemble is in no way descriptive music.

Although they are subjected to incessant variations and mutations, the gestures, patterns or characteristic sound elements stand out as landmarks that structure the work. The solo violin emerges in this context to unfold a melodic and expressive line, in a style often incantatory. This piece tends to create a reflection in line with the irrational and rational literary universe of Marguerite Yourcenar, and more generally with the idea of transcendence.

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