Makrokosmos is a series of four volumes of pieces for piano

Piano

The piano is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It is one of the most popular instruments in the world. Widely used in classical and jazz music for solo performances, ensemble use, chamber music and accompaniment, the piano is also very popular as an aid to composing and rehearsal...

 by American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 composer

Composer

A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...

 George Crumb

George Crumb

George Crumb is an American composer of contemporary classical music. He is noted as an explorer of unusual timbres, alternative forms of notation, and extended instrumental and vocal techniques. Examples include seagull effect for the cello , metallic vibrato for the piano George Crumb (born...

. The name alludes to Mikrokosmos, a set of piano pieces by Béla Bartók

Béla Bartók

Béla Viktor János Bartók was a Hungarian composer and pianist. He is considered one of the most important composers of the 20th century and is regarded, along with Liszt, as Hungary's greatest composer...

, one of Crumb's favorite 20th-century composers. The first volume of the set was composed in 1972, while the last was completed in early 1979; the first performance of all four volumes in sequence was given by Ivar Mikhashoff, Aki Takahashi

Aki Takahashi

is a Japanese pianist specializing in contemporary classical music.-Biography:Born in Kamakura, she began studying piano at the age of five and received her M.A. degree from the Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music. Her teachers included Yutaka Ito, Ray Lev, and George Vásárhelyi...

, Stephen Manes

Stephen Manes

Stephen Manes is the author of the 2011 nonfiction book Where Snowflakes Dance and Swear: Inside the Land of Ballet. Its subject, the workings of a ballet company, marked a significant departure for an author best known for his journalism on technology and his books for children.Manes wrote the...

, Freida Manes, Jan Williams and Lynn Harbold, in Buffalo, New York

Buffalo, New York

Buffalo is the second most populous city in the state of New York, after New York City. Located in Western New York on the eastern shores of Lake Erie and at the head of the Niagara River across from Fort Erie, Ontario, Buffalo is the seat of Erie County and the principal city of the...

, on 12 June 1980.

Volume I

Makrokosmos, Volume I was composed in 1972 for pianist and friend David Burge

David Burge

David Burge is an American pianist, conductor and composer. As a performer, he is noted for championing contemporary pieces....

 (who previously commissioned and premiered Crumb's Five Pieces for Piano (1962)). The collection is subtitled Twelve Fantasy-Pieces after the Zodiac and is scored for amplified piano. Its contents is as follows:

• Part 1:

1. Primeval Sounds (Genesis I) (Cancer)
2. Proteus (Pisces)
3. Pastorale (from the Kingdom of Atlantis, ca. 10,000 B.C.) (Taurus)
4. Crucifixus [SYMBOL] (Capricorn)
   • Part 2:
5. The Phantom Gondolier (Scorpio)
6. Night-Spell I (Sagittarius)
7. Music of Shadows (for Aeolian Harp) (Libra)
8. The Magic Circle of Infinity (Moto Perpetuo) [SYMBOL] (Leo)
   • Part 3:
9. The Abyss of Time (Virgo)
10. Spring-Fire (Aries)
11. Dream Images (Love-Death Music) (Gemini)
12. Spiral Galaxy [SYMBOL] (Aquarius)

The last piece of each part is notated in such a way that the score forms an image: a cross (piece 4), a circle (piece 8), and a spiral (piece 12). Burge premiered Volume I at Colorado College

Colorado College

The Colorado College is a private liberal arts college in Colorado Springs, Colorado, United States, in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains. It was founded in 1874 by Thomas Nelson Haskell...

, Colorado Springs, on 8 February 1973.

Volume II

The second volume of Makrokosmos was completed in 1973. It largely follows the organizational scheme of the first volume, bears the same subtitle (i.e. Twelve Fantasy-Pieces after the Zodiac) and is also scored for amplified piano. Crumb has stated that the two volumes form a sequence of 24 fantasy-pieces. Volume II comprises the following works:

• Part 1:

1. Morning Music (Genesis II) (Cancer)
2. The Mystic Chord (Saggitarius)
3. Rain-Death Variations (Pisces)
4. Twin Suns (Doppelgänger aus der Ewigkeit) [SYMBOL] (Gemini)
   • Part 2:
5. Ghost-Nocturne: for the Druids of Stonehenge (Night-Spell II) (Virgo)
6. Gargoyles (Taurus)
7. Tora! Tora! Tora! (Cadenza Apocalittica) (Scorpio)
8. A Prophecy of Nostradamus [SYMBOL] (Aries)
   • Part 3:
9. Cosmic Wind (Libra)
10. Voices from "Corona Borealis" (Aquarius)
11. Litany of the Galactic Bells (Leo)
12. Agnus Dei [SYMBOL] (Capricorn)

Similarly to Volume I, the last piece of each part is notated so that the score forms an image: two circles (piece 4), the peace sign (piece 12), etc. The collection was premiered by Robert Miller at the Alice Tully Hall

Alice Tully Hall

Alice Tully Hall is a concert hall at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New York City. It is named for Alice Tully, a New York performer and philanthropist whose donations assisted in the construction of the hall...

, New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

, on 12 November 1974.

Volume III

A collection of five pieces completed in 1974 and titled Music for a Summer Evening forms the third volume of Makrokosmos. It departs considerably from the previous two. Commissioned by the Fromm Music Foundation for Swarthmore College, the work is scored for two amplified pianos and percussion (two players), contains fewer pieces, and does not associate any of the pieces with Zodiac signs. The contents is as follows:

1. Nocturnal Sounds (The Awakening)
2. Wanderer-Fantasy
3. The Advent (including Hymn for the Nativity of the Star-Child)
4. Myth
5. Music of the Starry Night

Three of the pieces bear an epigraph

Epigraph (literature)

In literature, an epigraph is a phrase, quotation, or poem that is set at the beginning of a document or component. The epigraph may serve as a preface, as a summary, as a counter-example, or to link the work to a wider literary canon, either to invite comparison or to enlist a conventional...

: piece 1 from Victor Hugo

Victor Hugo

Victor-Marie Hugo was a Frenchpoet, playwright, novelist, essayist, visual artist, statesman, human rights activist and exponent of the Romantic movement in France....

's Quasimodo

Quasimodo

Quasimodo is a fictional character in the novel The Hunchback of Notre-Dame by Victor Hugo. Quasimodo was born with a hunchback and feared by the townspeople as a sort of monster but he finds sanctuary in an unlikely love that is fulfilled only in death. The role of Quasimodo has been played by...

, piece 3 from Pascal

Blaise Pascal

Blaise Pascal , was a French mathematician, physicist, inventor, writer and Catholic philosopher. He was a child prodigy who was educated by his father, a tax collector in Rouen...

, and piece 5 from Rilke

Rainer Maria Rilke

René Karl Wilhelm Johann Josef Maria Rilke , better known as Rainer Maria Rilke, was a Bohemian–Austrian poet. He is considered one of the most significant poets in the German language...

. Music for a Summer Evening was premiered by Gilbert Kalish and James Freeman (piano), Raymond DesRoches and Richard Fitz (percussion) at Swarthmore College

Swarthmore College

Swarthmore College is a private, independent, liberal arts college in the United States with an enrollment of about 1,500 students. The college is located in the borough of Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, 11 miles southwest of Philadelphia....

, Pennsylvania

Pennsylvania

The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is a U.S. state that is located in the Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The state borders Delaware and Maryland to the south, West Virginia to the southwest, Ohio to the west, New York and Ontario, Canada, to the north, and New Jersey to...

, on 30 March 1974.

Volume IV

The collection that forms the fourth instance of Makrokosmos is titled Celestial Mechanics, and subtitled Cosmic Dances for Amplified Piano, Four Hands. It was completed in April 1979.

1. Alpha Centauri
2. Beta Cygni
3. Gamma Draconis
4. Delta Orionis

The cycle was premiered by Gilbert Kalish

Gilbert Kalish

Gilbert Kalish is an American pianist.He was born in New York and studied with Leonard Shure, Julius Hereford and Isabelle Vengerova. He was a founding member of the Contemporary Chamber Ensemble, a pioneering new music group that flourished during the 1960s and '70s...

 and Paul Jacobs

Paul Jacobs

Paul Jacobs can refer to:*Paul Jacobs , American activist**Paul Jacobs and the Nuclear Gang, documentary film about the above*Paul Jacobs , Flemish author*Paul Jacobs , professional hockey player...

at the Alice Tully Hall, New York City, on 18 November 1979.

External links

• Composition pages on The Official George Crumb Homepage:
  • Volume I
  • Volume II
  • Music for a Summer Evening
  • Celestial Mechanics