Midnight Sun

Apparently my video is too big for Blogger, so click on this link: http://youtu.be/ZL-kvtgrL7U

Here's the third movement of my "Arctic" violin concerto that I just finished writing. I titled it "Midnight Sun" after the famous summer phenomenon whereby the sun never sets. It's actually about one specific night in 2012, the last night of a two-week research cruise in the Fram Strait, when two friends and I decided to sit up all night and watch the sun from the ship's helicopter deck. We wrapped ourselves in blankets and chatted about everything possible just to keep ourselves awake. The background photo in the video is one that I took of the sun that night. In the morning, we were rewarded with views of spectacular cliffs as the ship entered a fjord and arrived in Tromsø, Norway.

The musical structure of this piece reflects the sun's pattern: it sank in the west, flirted with the northern horizon, and then came back up in the east. The notes of the solo violin part are all in a high-low-high pattern, and this pattern exists on multiple scales. Every set of three notes is high-low-high; every measure (3 groups of 3 notes) are high-low-high; every ~100 measures are arranged in a high-low-high pattern; and the entire piece is highest at the beginning and end and lowest in the middle. Make sense? Maybe? Please note this pattern only counts for the solo violin part; I did whatever I wanted with the accompaniment. If you have the option, turn up your bass or use really well-isolated headphones when you listen to this piece because the cello plays an essential role in driving the dissonant harmonies in the middle section.

Enjoy!