Instrumentation: hichiriki and cello

Duration: 8 minutes

Year composed: 2024

First performance: Thomas Piercy (hichiriki), Seiko Takemoto (cello), Tokyo Concerts Lab., Tokyo, Japan, February, 16th 2024

Program note: La luciole se cache dans la lune is taken from the French translation of Ryōta’s haïku. It is part of a diptych with La cage sombre des lucioles for shakuhachi and clarinet. In La luciole se cache dans la lune, the hichiriki and the cello evolve together, emerging alternately from one other. This imbrication is implied by the title “the firefly is hidden in the moon”. The two instruments try to blend with each other, but sometimes the two timbres break apart like a failed attempt by the firefly to blend into the moonlight, revealing its true color.

La luciole se cache dans la lune is warmly dedicated to Thomas Piercy.