Michael D. Knopf

Music for the Dark Hours

Music for the Dark Hours was composed with the idea of evoking a night-scape of mood and scene. The individual pieces’ titles carry only a single material meaning on the surface, but the music ranges more broadly, referencing in the composer’s mind, the perception, memory, and emotional states of the human condition at night.

Though the provenance of the music’s ideas and mood are not specifically analogous, such act as an initial impetus for development in motif, colour, texture and shape.

1. Nocturnal Flight

The characteristic arpeggio is the medium for the piece’s trajectory and thematic material, including the harmonic changes from which emerge single note echoes and small group melodic injections.

2. Facets of Nightfall

Little sounds, in hushed surrounds, emanate from the dark. A brief melodic section interrupts the space. Other sounds then occur, emerging, then drifting to quiet.

3. Scudding Clouds and Lunar Light

The music is animated rhythmically, with rising and falling melodic lines as if blown by the wind. The shifting harmonies impart a transience to the music’s relentless motion.