Erasure - Sun Keting (2019)
Erased de Kooning Drawing (right)
Robert Rauschenberg
1953
Erasure is a piece for flute, yangqin and piano, inspired by one of Robert Rauschenberg’s works - ‘Erased de Kooning’, a painting that Rauschenberg borrowed from Willem de Kooning and took a month to erase. Rauschenberg’s intention was simply to ‘beat’ or ‘erase’ Bill de Kooning’s art. Although it was not spiritually inspired, his idea of erasure has parallels with the Eastern concept of emptiness, and it seems an effective way of describing to a western audience the quality of emptiness within Eastern philosophy, which both Taoism and Buddhism have at their core.
My piece plays upon concepts of ‘creation’ and ‘deletion’ within the same process as a way of reflecting the practice of meditation: one gains thoughts as much as they learn to let them go. During the creation part, I would allow the notes to come to me, writing them down in real time, whereas, within the erasing process, I would methodically erase notes in a much more meticulous manner. Erased de Kooning serves as a good example of how the removal of one subject can allow for the appearance of another ‘wonder’.
My piece plays upon concepts of ‘creation’ and ‘deletion’ within the same process as a way of reflecting the practice of meditation: one gains thoughts as much as they learn to let them go. During the creation part, I would allow the notes to come to me, writing them down in real time, whereas, within the erasing process, I would methodically erase notes in a much more meticulous manner. Erased de Kooning serves as a good example of how the removal of one subject can allow for the appearance of another ‘wonder’.
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My initial compositional thoughts for this trio instrumentation lead me towards the idea of sharing the features and timbres of the piano upon the yangqin, whilst the flute remains as a solo woodwind. The yangqin has been called the "Chinese piano" as it has an indispensable role in the accompaniment of Chinese string and wind instruments, additionally due to the similarities between how both instruments are built. To produce sound, pianists must press down at least one key, which triggers the hammer to strike a specific string. When the hammer rebounds, the strings continue to vibrate. This process is very similar to the way in which the yangqin produces sounds. In this piece, I wanted this similarity between yangqin and piano to be expressed and in order to do so, some of the piano keys are dampened and their musical materials are often echoing one another.
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Last year, I was very lucky to have composed for an octet piece, One Undivided, for LSO string quartet and the Silk Quartet, consisting of the erhu, pipa, guzheng and yangqin. This combination of western and traditional Chinese instruments has fascinated me so much ever since and so I am very excited and grateful to Tangram for giving me a new opportunity to discover more.
Notes by Sun Keting
'Erasure' was commissioned by Tangram with generous support from Silk Road Ensemble. It was premiered at Rye Arts Festival on 22 September 2019 by Tangram. Its second performance was by Silk Road Ensemble at Boston Conservatory's Chamber Series on 27 September 2019.
Notes by Sun Keting
'Erasure' was commissioned by Tangram with generous support from Silk Road Ensemble. It was premiered at Rye Arts Festival on 22 September 2019 by Tangram. Its second performance was by Silk Road Ensemble at Boston Conservatory's Chamber Series on 27 September 2019.