1(=picc).1.1(=bcl).1(=cbsn) – 1.1.1.0 – perc(2) – pno – 2vln.vla.vc.db

Collider (2021)
15 players (10’)

Collider begins with an impassioned howl from the string quintet, music suggestive of the pain of absence which seems unavoidably connected to the various kinds of absence endured during the COVID-19 pandemic. This yearning is quickly answered by an explosion of rhythmic activity in the brass and percussion, a harmonic engine that drives the music through wildly contrasting episodes. Midway anxious woodwinds over a skittering hi-hat warn of a malfunction, leading to a nervous breakdown for the full ensemble followed by a return of the anguish of the opening, this time more extended. Eventually the engine returns to life even more intensely than before, ending in a coda of unbridled joy.

The title was suggested partly by particle colliders, the enormous underground machines like CERN in Geneva which investigate the dance of matter and energy making up the universe, and partly by the sense of touch and colliding with strangers in urban environments, so strangely missing the past couple of years.

Commissioned by UPROAR and first performed by the ensemble conducted by Michael Rafferty at Pontio, Bangor on 12th February 2022