Programme notes:

Resonance is at the same time the title of and the basic idea behind this work for piano. With silently depressed keys and thereby resonating strings, resonating sound-spaces are formed. These differ in character depending upon where in the harmonic series on these string the tones that are played resonate against: “nearby“ sound sound-spaces with resonance strings an octave below, or lager and “remote“ sound-spaces with resonance strings at a greater distance than an octave from the tones played. One can describe these acoustic phenomena as sounding holograms, i.e. different acoustical sound-spaces in an available sound-space – the concert auditorium. In this way the piano becomes a kind of acoustic peephole into smaller or larger, quickly changing sound-spaces independent of existing acoustics of the room. The acoustics of the concert auditorium however can make it difficult to perceive these sound-spaces inside of the instrument, and in this case a light reinforcement by means of a microphone is recommended. For a purely acoustical performance of the work, almost “dry“ room acoustics is requisite. The work was premiered in June, 1984 in Brussels by the Belgian pianist Fanny Tran. Anders Nilsson