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CRISTÓBAL MARYÁN
A Hummingbird's Heart
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Piece commissioned by and dedicated to Dr. Jonathan Thompson. When Jonathan commissioned this piece, a musical idea of a note repeated in irregular patterns came to my head. After writing this idea in the score, I realized its agility combined with its delicacy reminded me of a Hummingbird. It was then I titled it "Heart of a Hummingbird." I based the rhythmic variations of the piece on the rhythmic vocal systems of Indian Carnatic music. In such tradition, the performers aid their performance of triplets, quintuplets and other subdivisions by giving each unit of the subdivision a specific syllable. Even though this is not evident in the piece, the technique can be used by the performers to ease the piece's technical difficulties.
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