Barry Guy

what is the word (2019)

Barry Guy
(b. 1947)

Composed for
50 For The Future:
The Kronos Learning
Repertoire

Artist Statement

“It was the great Irish actor Barry McGovern that illuminated the elegiac meditational quality and pathos of Samuel Beckett’s last poem “what is the word.” His delivery of the text grabbed my attention whilst I was pondering over a structure for the quartet, and inspired me to consider the architecture based on the internal and mostly hidden rhythm of Beckett’s words.

“Following extensive analysis of the poem, a kind of exoskeleton within which the composition could be formulated came into view.

“Quietness, introspection, an implied questioning (although the question mark is never used in the text), and perhaps a yearning for an unfulfilled sense of place were the apparent qualities of the poem. But I sensed an interior turmoil too—a liminal space suggesting a void, an uncertainty constantly tested by reasoning. Indeed, the quartet music has turmoil, but is always arrested by modified references to fragments from “O Lord my God,” a verse anthem by the English composer Pelham Humfrey (1647–74). Henry Purcell was (briefly) one of his pupils. These fragments offer calm moments where the focus is at the threshold/boundary between thoughts.

“David Harrington (Kronos Quartet violinist, founder, and artistic director) suggested I might wish to reference Henry Purcell in the piece. Humfrey however, was already on my radar, so to honour David’s suggestion, the first ten seconds of the piece utilise repetitions of a single distorted pitch which was used near the conclusion of my composition “Buzz” for Viol consort which reflected Purcell’s “Fantasia Upon One Note.” This articulation was in turn an homage to Charles Mingus, my bassist hero in my youth and to this day.

“Mingus was the first bassist I heard making a buzzing sound by pulling a string off to the side of the fingerboard whilst plucking with the right hand. A very evocative sonority.

“A further manifestation in the score consists of glissandi passages that are through-composed, but additionally, are graphically represented to offer the players a chance to exercise their improvisational skills in a more spontaneous scenario. Risky territory, but exciting!

“The work of Samuel Beckett has been a constant companion throughout my life, and this string quartet—an act without (obvious) words—represents another part of the journey where I have been irresistibly drawn into his beautiful, strange world observing the human condition. This short composition, I hope, will take the quartet and listener on an equally fascinating journey."

“To the memory of my twin sister, Gill, a true humanitarian.”

With thanks to Edward Beckett and the Samuel Beckett Estate for permission to use “what is the word” as the title for this string quartet.

Barry Guy