Instrumentation: picc. 2 – 2 – E.h. – 2 – B. cl. – 2 – Ctrb / 4 – 3 – 2 – B. trb – 1/ 3 perc. – timb / hp / pno / 12 – 10 – 8 – 6 – 4

Duration: 8 minutes

Year composed: 2014

Performers: Carnegie Mellon Philharmonic, Daniel Curtis (conductor)

First performance: Carnegie Mellon Philharmonic, Daniel Curtis (conductor), March 5, 2015, Carnegie Music Hall, Pittsburgh, USA.

Program note: “Mais quand d’un passé ancien rien ne subsiste, après la mort des êtres, après la destruction des choses, seuls, plus frêles mais plus vivaces, plus immatérielles, plus persistantes, plus fidèles, l’odeur et la saveur restent encore longtemps, comme des âmes, à se rappeler, à attendre, à espérer, sur la ruine de tout le reste, à porter sans fléchir, sur leur gouttelette presque impalpable, l’édifice immense du souvenir”. (Marcel Proust, Du côté de chez Swann)

L’écho d’un lointain souvenir, completed in November 2014, is the result of research about the persistance of memory and its alteration. The inspiration for this piece comes from Dali’s masterpiece “La persistance de la mémoire” and the above quotation from Marcel Proust.

This piece is built upon two principal motifs. The first motif represents an idée fixe, an obsession implanted in our memory. This motif emerges for the first time from the vibraphone. It is present throughout the piece, in variation, like how our memory occasionally acts. The first motif leads to the second, which consists of a repeated A acting like an intruder within the piece. This omnipresent note goes from one instrument to another with some alterations in its timbre and rhythm, representing a distant echo in our memory which is altered by time.

These representations of echoes and memories lead to some changes of color in the orchestra. It draws on the change of our soul, that which happens to our memories, going from joyful to painful.