Thursday, January 7, 2021

György Ligeti | Trois Bagatelles






György Ligeti
Trois Bagatelles 
New York City, USA: Fluxus, 1964
19 x 21 cm.
Edition size unknown

A bagatelle is a short piece of music, typically for the piano, and usually of a light, dulcet character: "a short unpretentious instrumental composition". The term is also used to describe "a thing regarded as too unimportant or easy to be worth much consideration."

Hungarian composer György Ligeti's Three Bagatelles is dedicated to pianist David Tudor (best known for debuting John Cage's 'silent' composition 4'33"). The 1961 work consists exclusively of one long C#1 whole note played in the first movement. Following that, the movement changes are marked by the turning of each page and the piece ends when the pianist stands up and takes a bow. 

The score also includes a fourth bagatelle as an encore, to be performed at the pianist's discretion.  It consists entirely of a sixteenth note rest.

John Cage was said to be deeply offended by the parody. 

The original manuscript is kept in Basel, in the Sacher Stiftung, as part of the Nordwall Collection, The piece was first performed in Wiesbaden by Karl-Erik Welin. 

A year after it's inclusion in Fluxus 1 it was published as a score by New York City-based Schott Music. It was reprinted (above, bottom) by the German publisher Schott, in 2000. 

The score was omitted from later collations of Fluxus 1 by Maciunas, and the only other work by Ligeti published by Fluxus was Poeme Symphonique, which appeared in the first Fluxus newspaper. 




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