Persephassa

Iannis Xenakis

General Info

Year: 19
Duration: c.
Difficulty: (see Ratings for explanation)
Publisher: Editions Salabert
Cost: Score and Parts - $0.00   |   Score Only - $0.00

Instrumentation

Player I:
Player II:
Player III:
Player IV:
Player V:
Player VI:

Program Notes

Persephassa gains much of its effect from having the six percussionists distributed around the audience. The treatment of space as a musical parameter is one of the most important preoccupations of Xenakis' music, particularly in his works of the mid-to-late 1960s. (See, for example, Terretektorh (1966), which "distributes the eighty-eight musicians in quasi-stochastic fashion in a circular space around the conductor, with the audience being seated amid the musicians.") The dramatic impact of utilizing the performance space in this manner is evident in many passages throughout the piece in which accents or imitative rhythms are passed around the ensemble. At one point, "Xenakis creates an enormous accelerando, building up as many as six layers of spiraling patterns swirling around the listeners. The tempo of that passage winds up to 360 beats per minute, with one complete rotation of rolled accents around the six players every second... these mesmerizing patterns are enhanced by isolated dynamic accents and by interruptions of silence or stochastic clouds of percussive sonorities."

The percussionists use a wide range of instruments and sound effects during the piece, including sirens, maracas, and pebbles, along with an arsenal of drums, wood blocks (simantras), cymbals, and gongs.

In 2010, the Make Music New York festival presented a performance of Persephassa on and around Central Park Lake in New York City, with audience members listening from rowboats.

Pléïades is another Xenakis composition for six percussionists. Composed in 1978, it was commissioned by Les Percussions de Strasbourg.

Recent Performances

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Works for Percussion by this Composer

Aïs - Multiple Percussion; Voice; Orchestra
Dmaathen - Multiple Percussion; Oboe
Komboï - Multiple Percussion; Harpsichord
Okho - Percussion Trio - Djembe
Oophaa - Multiple Percussion; Harpsichord
Persephassa - Percussion Sextet
Pléiades - Percussion Sextet
Psappha - Multiple Percussion Solo
Rebonds - Multiple Percussion Solo