Triptychfor solo piano[1:08]In our pantheon of domains celebrating the number 3 -- spatial dimensions,
miles in a league, barleycorns in an inch, primary hues, branches of govern-
ment, ring circus, cornered hats, kings of Orient, the Trinity, penny opera,
musketeers, little pigs, billy goats Gruff -- I venture to include Triads.
SCOREI. Riddle
Two out-of-sync chromatic scales, diverging from an indecisive center buzz,
mask the progression of main triads (built either entirely of interval classes
or entirely of octave complements) as listed in the Lexicon graph (p. 4-5):
sequentially, the first bars of A-T followed by their second bars in reverse.
Accidentals apply once only -- a style LilyPond terms "Forget".
II. Dance
A quasi-flamenco, realizing the 32 chromatic-saturating triad pair collections
of the Series graph (p. 6). Its 3-8ths units are sequenced to suggest/evoke
alliterative rhyme: a b c, a b d; a b c', a b d'; a b' c, a b' d; a b' c', a b' d';....
III. Echo
Riddle's masked triads now converge instead, as the chromatic main lines
have been reversed (if not simply swapped), and the buzz alternatives are
conjoined. In expression, as though vanishing.
APPENDIXGraph 1: Triad Lexicon (pp. 4-5)
A uniquely sorted collection of triads (110, discounting transpositions) built
from intervals within the octave. Its layout reflects their interval-class sort
structure: primary columns by difference; horizontal levels by total.
Graph 2: Chromatic-filling Series (p. 6)
A collection of 3-triad-pairs series, each series with a common initial pair
(or its octave complement), its subsequent pairs then saturating the pitch-
class spectrum. Chords are specified once each with ruled lines tracing
their multiple paths of combination.
Note re numbering in the graphs
Each vertical number-pair names its triads's component intervals measured
in semitones. Each singular number names its chord pair's inner melodic
interval (the component-interval difference). The second chords, all mirror
inversions, are not number-flagged.