Bryn Harrison: Double Labyrinth After Richard Dunn

Description

Double Labyrinth after Richard Dunn comprises two versions of the eponymous work-in-progress by Bryn Harrison, which continues to develop through a process of dialogue, exchange, and group exploration with the members of ELISION, Australia's premier contemporary music ensemble. The piece was written in memory of senior Australian visual artist Richard Dunn (1944-2024), a profound thinker and intellect. It takes Dunn's Double Labyrinth paintings made in 2005 as its starting point. Like the paintings, the music invites its audience to explore a series of dense pathways. Loops and entanglements catch the ear as the virtuosic performers navigate these pathways, their moment-to-moment interactions, constantly in flux, producing textures that are at once simple and complex. Chromatic lines performed at a speed and density that make them difficult to apprehend overlap one another unpredictably, giving way to flutters and trills that are fleeting and ephemeral. Over time, the repetition intensifies; eddies and whirlpools of sound emerge from the work's bristling surface. A metallic sound-world transitions to a woodier sonority before eventually giving way to a calm final section comprising drone-like material.