ærc duos

Weeks, James

Dr James Weeks james.d.weeks@durham.ac.uk
Associate Professor

Weeks, J. (2018). ærc duos. [score]. York

Other Type	Composition
Online Publication Date	May 1, 2018
Publication Date	May 1, 2018
Deposit Date	Sep 11, 2023
Publicly Available Date	Sep 12, 2023
Public URL	https://durham-repository.worktribe.com/output/1735123
Additional Information	ærc is the Old English word for ark, derived from the Latin arca, a chest. Here it denotes an enclosed space, perhaps of refuge or safety, certainly of intimacy. ærc duos is derived from my ensemble piece ærc (2016), for a large number of orchestral string instruments. In that work, the players are paired, as in the ark of Noah, entering the figurative space of the work two-by-two and creating a dense polyphonic texture (a giant viol consort) from breath-like bow-strokes, each pair in rhythmic unison, before exiting in sequence. In ærc duos only one pair of instruments is present. The material is almost identical to that of ærc, but I have added a ninth piece (IX) to the original eight.