Songs From a Spiral Tree

SUL FILO DEI TRAMONTI — text by Gian Giacomo Menon

Writing this program note is more difficult than usual, for two reasons. First, due to the very sad event that happened during the composition of the piece: the poet passed away before the work was done, and given his health conditions in recent times, we do not know if he could have realized that I was setting two of his poems to music. And to think that I wanted to do this ever since I met the poet, in Udine in the late 1980s. The second reason has to do with the difficulty of speaking about a poem that I was able to understand more instinctively than at the level of literal meaning. I was able to appreciate the mastery that Menon had on the subtleties of Italian especially through the sound, rhythm and flow of images of his works, and also the ability to invent new words to force the language to express what he wanted. It seems to me that what he wanted was (is) a beautiful introspective lyricism, which manages to build from the most disparate images, sounds and thought-feelings a unified poetic vision, saturated with an exquisite and intimate expression.

This is precisely what I try to capture with music, making a mixture of words and sound that transforms all this “raw material” into something new, a sort of “interpretation by transformation”, or rather, a translation into an entirely different dimension.

The title of the piece, from another Menon poem, captures, in just four words, a complexity full of feelings and multi-dimensional references. This seems to me to be the essence of Menon’s poetry, a poet for poets.

Technically, Sul Filo dei Tramonti represents yet another exploration of the resources of my Dyad System, where both the notes and the electronic sounds are derived from the same basic structure. The electronic sounds are here only stereophonic, and it was a very interesting challenge to try to create different senses of depth and space in contrast with the immobile presence of the soprano and the pianist. The structure of the music is a close variation on the structure of the poem, and is particularly evident in the second of the two selections.

The sounds were made with my MUSIC30 digital sound synthesis program and then further elaborated and transformed with a variety of audio signal processing procedures.

— James Dashow

Text

Sul Filo dei Tramonti
due liriche dalla Mont
per soprano, pianoforte e suoni elettronici
poesia di Gian Giacomo Menon

I.
da “I fermagli notturni e la carta dell’ombra”
i fermagli notturni e la carta dell’ombra
tessuti della memoria
oggi come ieri e domani l’implacabile sempre
non si cambia chi ha piantato la tenda
e il respiro dell’orsa è curvo sopra di noi
antichi segni circolano per le pareti
e si concludono in un nodo di neve
la mattina rotta nei colombi improvvisi
attenzione della pena che stringe a sinistra
prima della figura obbligata
un volto si libera dalle finestre e discende la scala
e non si esaurisce il delirio
simile all’erba intrecciata di piogge e di vento
e non ha forma né proporzione di ritorni
ed è uguale la cifra che marca e qualita il tempo
e si accetta la strada alberata di gru
un sussulto di buchi e di croste
le nebbie aggrappate l’una sull’altra
un disegno che imita il silenzio
la lancia staccata dal fianco
e non trovi la ferita nascosta
un nome da isolare e pronunciato a rovescio
il cuore autorizzato sull’arco
se i cani sbranano le indicazioni dipinte
una porta chiusa di spalle
e il fuoco inventato per vincere il freddo elementare
e raccogliersi dentro l’assurdo

II.
(n. 5253 28 ottobre 1987)

come là dove le solitudini e l’onda della terra il
fermo pietrame la terra rossa come là dove la stagione
ha il suo tempo un principio e nomi familiari

e sono più giorni ed uno è scelto nelle origini
come là dove vicino a quella terra sono cerchiati
uomini e sono di attrezzo e di porta per sentieri
e viottoli e anche i fuochi si portano con lode
come là dove è la magrezza dell’acqua e la rabbia
d’essa e l’uscire d’essa contro morte muraglie e
il tornare d’essa per l’arbusto e per l’erba levigati
ciottoli dentro le mani oh come là dov’era
dove stava dove taceva dove diceva parole oh purpuree
rotonde sottili oh anche leggere anche scosse
dal vento

Translation:

On Sunsets’ Edge, two lyrics from the Mont

I.
from “Nocturnal conjunctions and shadowed paper ”
the nocturnal conjunctions and shadowed paper
threads of memory
today as yesterday and tomorrow the relentless always
you do not change who pitched the tent
and the big dipper’s breath curves above us
ancient signs circulate around the walls
and end in a knot of snow
the morning broken in the sudden pigeons
beware the pain that tightens on the left
before the obligatory figure
a face frees itself from the windows and descends the staircase
and the delirium does not end
like grass intertwined with rain and wind
and has no form nor proportion of returns
and equals the figure that marks and qualities time
and you accept the road tree-lined with cranes
a jolt of holes and edges
the mists clinging to each other
a design that mimics silence
the spear detached from the side
and you don’t find the hidden wound
a name to be isolated and pronounced backwards
the heart authorized on the bow
if the dogs lacerate the painted signs
a door closed from behind
and the fire invented to overcome the elementary cold
and gather inside the absurd

II.
(n.5253 October 28, 1987)

as there where the loneliness and the wave of the earth the
stones immobile in the red earth as where the season
has its time a beginning and familiar names
and there are multiple days and one is chosen in the origins
as where near that land they are surrounded
the men and are tools and gateways for trails
and paths and even the fires are brought with praise
as where there is the water’s thinness and the anger
of it and going out of it against dead barriers and
the return of it to the polished saplings and grass
hand with pebbles oh as where it was
where it had been where it was silent where it spoke words oh dark red
round thin oh even light even shaken
by the wind

“I fermagli notturni e la carta dell’ombra”, da I BINARI DEL GALLO
(c) 1998 Campanotto Editore, Pasian di Prato (UD), Italia

(n. 5253 28 ottobre 1987)
manoscritto inedito dalla collezione Bombi-Dashow
(c) 1987 Gian Giacomo Menon