CCCXIX. LIGETI, György: Three Pieces for Two Pianos

CCCXIX. LIGETI, György (1923-2006)

Three Pieces for Two Pianos (1976)
1. Monument -- Strng und genau
2. Selbstportrait mit Reich und Riley (und Chopin ist auch dabei) -- Presto: so schnell und so gleichmäßig wie möglich
3. In zart fließender Bewegunt
Sun-Young Nam, piano
Reto Staub, piano
(19:47)

Ligeti:

"In Monument, I envisioned a huge, statuesque, imaginary architecture, with the interference of six layers of lattices.

The middle movement is an homage to the musical kinship I felt with Steve Reich and Terry Riley, and at first I called it "Still life with Reich and Riley." Then I thought that 'still life' -- nature morte -- wasn't a very friendly title, if it was about living composers. So I changed it to "Portrait." Since it wasn't actually a portrait of Reich and Riley, but partly a parody of my own Continuum, the piece became "Self-portrait with Reich and Riley." Finally, I tacked on alllusion to Chopin's famous B minor Presto at the end of the piece as a mechanical self-satire (it fairly cried out to be included, as an early precursor of quintessentially minimalist music). Hence to the title was added, "with Chopin in the background."

The third movement is a complex mirror canon, a "liquefied" variant of Monument, so to speak."