Assonance

Assonance is a tribute to Benjamin Britten’s Cello Suite No. 1, opus 72. 

Assonance is intended to portray a dialogue between two opposite, yet complementary characters. It does not seek to develop any material, but to articulate a collection of events inspired by the natural expressivity of the cello’s registers and expressive possibilities. The vocal quality of the high register speaks to the woody grain of the midrange and restarts in the sonorous bass colla parte before reiterating the Italian expressivity of the dialogue in the high-pitched apex. The profoundly emotional contrast embellishes the unfolding of the piece toward a similar narrative in the low bass at the end, mixing fifths and pizzicati, as if an unlikely reconciliation were to take place.