Peter Bannister
Pietà for keyboard (2018)
Duration: 5'
Solos:
keyboard
Pietà for keyboard (2018)
Sample pages
Video
Work introduction
Written for historical keyboard specialist Marcia Hadjimarkos and dedicated to the memory of Cecylia Berka (1926-2018), Pietà is a short work, yet within it the attentive listener may be able to discern echoes of many sources of inspiration. Apart from Michelangelo's masterpiece of the same name in St Peter's Basilica in Rome and structural references to the Passacaglias and chaconnes of J.S. Bach and Diderik Buxtehude, perhaps the most immediately apparent musical clin d’oeil takes the form of a more or less direct quote from Debussy's piano Prelude entitled Des pas sur la neige (the idea of the piece having originated during a conversation at a recital of the complete Book I of Debussy's Preludes). The final marking in the great French composer's score, "comme un tendre et triste regret" - once pointed out to me by my teacher Naji Hakim as an illustration of a fundamental principle of compositional poetics - could well serve as a motto for the present work. Other influences can however also be felt, ranging from the contemporary archaism of Gavin Bryars' haunting Ramble on Cortona (2011) to the meticulous keyboard touch of Keith Jarrett in his legendary 'Standards' Trio with Jack de Johnette and Gary Peacock, the melodic lines of consummate Dutch guitarist and lutenist Jan Akkerman or the dreamlike harmonies of Pat Metheny's early recordings such as New Chautauqua or Watercolors. Pietà is composed of thirteen brief continuous sections (a ground bass and twelve variations); not only is thirteen a number especially associated with the Virgin Mary in Catholic tradition, but the thirteenth Station of the Cross is the moment embodied by the Pietà when the dead Christ is placed in the arms of His Mother.
The score of Pietà includes versions both for keyboards tuned at A=422 or under as well as those at modern pitch.