This piece started as a rhythmic idea: an ostinato in 13/8 (which persists throughout the whole piece). At first I began experimenting with different figurations and harmonies to ‘flesh out’ this basic rhythm and subsequently started improvising melodies in the right hand over the left hand ostinato -- until, after spending some more time with it, I eventually arrived at the final ‘product’.
Since this substack is called “From my musical notebook”, I decided to share what I wrote in my notebook (pertaining to this piece) -- as this can give a little insight into the process of creating a piece of music like this one -- along with the audio recording of the ’finished‘ product1:
Note: in the recording, I followed the jazz performance tradition by first playing the theme more or less as it was composed (after a short intro), then improvising over the form of the theme, and at the end returning once again to the written theme. So it is a mixture of composition and improvisation -- of both planned elements and spontaneous elements...
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