Caducae resonantiae

Written for the centenary of James Joyce's Ulysses, the piece uses a particular scordatura that allows the realization of four tuning systems: 12-Equal Temperament, Pythagorean, Meantone and Just Intonation.

This simultaneous employment of different tuning systems was named by me polysystemism and it was discussed in many conferences, articles and essay in Europe. Among the venues where I have talked about it particular attention deserve la Cité de la Musique in Paris, l’Université de Strasbourg, the Liszt Academy of Music and the Hungarian Academy of Arts. Articles about polysystemism were published by von Bockel Verlag, the University of Prague as well as the subject of a master thesis degree at the Academy of Music of the Italian Switzerland in Lugano.

Polysystemism allows the realization of various physical-acoustic phenomena, such as complex beats, residual sounds and resonance effects. This piece makes use of only natural harmonics and it is written in such a way that the strings are always left to vibrate until the natural disappearance of the sound.

In this way two listening layers are created. The first layer is that of the melody and the second layer is composed of the sound trails of the sounds left to vibrate. Hence the title: Caducae resonantiae.

The piece was commissioned by and it is dedicated to Katalin Koltai.