Nuance, shade, atmosphere in haze: these are the hallmarks of Lachlan Skipworth’s oeuvre. Everything said concisely, and yet indirectly.
The collection of pieces in Chamber Works Vol II remain typical of these attributes: they exist as crafted worlds, evocative and intuitive. But they possess a transformed sense of immediacy, a vibrancy that rewards not only the patient listener, but is written to captivate from the very first note.
Even from the cover of the CD, a flush of colour, a far cry from the minimalist, monochrome cover of the first volume, this album promises something different. Though this leap forward is not without a glance backwards: to the fundamentals of melody, of harmony, of rhythm, and of course, to Bach. What follows is a new era for Skipworth, an era of rhythmic expressivity and of concise brevity, melodically determined. Bach’s offerings, whole harmonic sequences expressed through single melodic lines, are the driving force behind Skipworth’s reconception of melody, and ultimately, an inspiration for the Oboe Quartet, the opening work of the album.
Not only is the oboe, the centrepiece of the work, consequently responsible for crafting the work’s underlying harmonic foundations, but has a role that brims with energy: every note feels necessary, with an almost narrative power. The first movement emerges gracefully, shimmering; in the second, what begins as a careful interplay of cello and oboe descends into gentle mourning. A portrait of memory, the Oboe Quartet is a reminiscence on the philanthropists Alan and Anne Blanckensee, but shines a light on the brilliance of life rather than the depths of loss – and as such the middle movement is bookended by exuberance. The finale is dance-like, imbued with warmth. While the piano has a brief moment of rhythmic resistance, a reluctance to accept the work’s unusual metric groupings, the ensemble together knits a patchwork of persistent animation.
The Oboe Quartet is dependent on rhythmic groupings of five, a pattern that Skipworth draws on throughout almost all of the album’s works. While perhaps an unintuitive grouping, throughout the quartet the patterns feel playfully organic, though at times suggest a feeling of mystic incomprehensibility.
The same patterns characterise the Flute Sonata, but in a completely different landscape of sonority: a lush and demanding sound world confronts us with an unwavering confidence. Every note and every rhythm is of an assured exactness.
Having written extensively for the shakuhachi, Skipworth is careful to distinguish the Flute Sonata as a work specifically for flute. Incredibly virtuosic, the flute showcases its upper register, and its capacity for exceptional agility. The interplay between flute and piano is maintained by a sense of independence within each instrumental line: the intersection of voices feels at times marvellously coincidental, and yet, simultaneously, both lines are symbiotically intertwined.
The Flute Sonata is perhaps most emblematic of the sense of artistic transformation that comes with this album: it says everything it needs to say quickly and boldly, as if clinging firmly to a last opportunity. Even in its moments of comparative stillness, there is a sense of energised restlessness. It is luminous, and where the Oboe Quartet ebbs and flows down its rhythmically shifting pathway, the Flute Sonata is responsible for its own propulsion, which extends until the work’s very finish.
A contrasting moment of gentleness, what follows is the Piano Quartet no. 2, composed for a virtual- reality dance film. The work, the most conservative on the album, is melodically elegant, and of a homely warmth. This point of arrival on the album feels like a return, but if it is a return it is to an imagined past. We’re comforted by counterpoint and slow-moving melodies that deliberately deviate from the often ostinato-driven realm of film music.
Skipworth’s propensity for atmosphere is only enhanced by the focus on well-crafted melody. Despite having been described as possessing a ‘rare gift as a melodist’ it is the element of his compositions that Skipworth felt required a renewed focus. But in light of the Piano Quartet no. 2, the claim feels indisputable.
Even in Shingetsu, composed in preparation for the Oboe Quartet, glimmers of melodic mastery offer themselves through the piano’s rhythmic tricks. Shingetsu, like the Oboe Quartet and the Flute Sonata, is dominated by groups of fives, and during the work’s midpoint the illusion of an almost swing feel is created. Where previously rhythmic complexity might have led to aural obscurity, the melody here possesses a lilt that a listener might not be able to explain, but could most certainly hum.
The inclusion of Light Rain, for shakuhachi and string quartet, emblematic of Skipworth’s earlier work and studies, offers a moment from over a decade ago, a verification of the gulf crossed by this new emerging era. Placed as the penultimate work of the album, Light Rain is not only a leap back in time, but a moment of pause. Weightless, atemporal and melodically abstract, the soaring shakuhachi is separated from a sense of time, which the strings, as they grow in intensity, attempt to solidify. The work is yearning, and The Crossing, which grows as a soundscape from Light Rain’s decay to silence, continues this atmospheric turn but with a subtle shift in tone.
The Crossing, for mixed sextet and tape, was the first of these new period works to be composed. Again utilising groupings of five, the tape, consisting of canonically reversed piano and vibraphone, weaves a soundscape from which clarinet, flute, strings and percussion emerge with accented quaver ostinatos.
While the rhythmic momentum of the album’s other works is founded on a sense of spontaneity, a dance between leaps, pauses and ambles, The Crossing, unhurried, moves with metronomic persistence, seeming to naturalise the progression through shifting time signatures. The ending, in which the ensemble rises together in arpeggiated motions, is approached without hesitation, brimming with electricity, and concludes with an offering of rhythmically unified clarity.
It is the exact spirit of this album: offering. Complexity handled with care and shaped into music through which reward appears without searching.
© Paige Gullifer, 2022
