Influences & Allusions
These are highly subjective observations and conjectures!
In the program notes to Velocity Meadows, Stark mentions that he took inspiration for the piece from the poetry of Mark Strand – specifically, the dream-like atmosphere of Strand’s words evoked the quality of Stark’s own surrealist dreams which comprise the episodes of the work. In studying Velocity Meadows, I have wondered if there is some influence from John Adams’ Harmonielehre, both in terms of the programmatic affinities between these two works (Adams mentions the prominence of his dreams in his program notes for the work) and in the somewhat similar harmonic languages of these two pieces. (To give one example, there is a “slide”1 transformation at the opening of the third movement of Velocity Meadows from F#m7 to FM7 that is similar to the prominent slide back and forth between Em7 and EbM7 in the opening of Harmonielehre). [See the note on pitch materials for more information].
The note on form draws a parallel between the outer two movements (movement I is entitled “Waves with Spectra”) and the influence of spectralism on Velocity Meadows. Grisey’s Partiels springs to mind as a point of comparison, particularly for the ending of Velocity Meadows. Additionally, the works of James Tenney seem like useful conversation partners for Velocity Meadows as well as Stark’s Two-Handed Storytelling – score • audio – for piano and pre-recorded sounds which also make use of repeated-note figures in imitating the beating of complex spectral harmonies. Tenney’s Spectral CANON for CONLON Nancarrow and the canon from Two Koans and a Canon may be fruitful points of reference. (Note that use of live delay systems in both the Tenney canon and in Velocity Meadows).
Finally, Stark mentions the work of David Maslanka as an influence on the episodic structure of the work. I think the importance of J.S. Bach in the music of Maslanka has also played a role in Velocity Meadows – the canonic material alluded to in the title of movement IV begins with a transposed version of the B-A-C-H motive. (Here it’s rendered as F-E-G-F# in several of the upper voices and in the solo oboe – cf. mm. 144-150).
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Slide is a Neo-Riemannian transformation in which the third is retained between a major triad and the minor triad a semitone above it (or vice-versa). ↩