'points on the curve to find...' (author's note)

“Points on the curve to find…”
for piano and chamber orchestra (1974)

The title “Points on the curve to find...” describes the way in which the work has been composed, a way partly related to the experience of my Chemins. In Points I wrote first the piano part and then the instrumental parts extending and commenting on it. The piano part - almost always monophonic and periodic - can be regarded as a complex curve, a continuous and changing line on which the other instruments rest to interpret and develop its harmonic characters: like a finished drawing on top of which new lines are added in various points, lines that modify its meaning and bring to light its hidden properties. Through speed of articulation, tempo changes and the specific nature of those harmonic characters, the piece can be perceived sometimes as a more or less complex, but always homogeneous “waveform”.
“Points on the curve to find…”, written in 1974 for the pianist Anthony Di Bonaventura, is the starting-point of another work for piano and two instrumental groups, Concerto II - Echoing Curves.

Luciano Berio

Note d'autore: informazioni generali | Author's note: general info