Stephen Hartke
Caoine
CAOINE (1980)
for Solo Violin
Duration: 8 Minutes
"Caoine" (pronounced keen) is the Gaelic word for the wail or dirge sung by professional
mourners in old Ireland. This traditional form (and Hartke's piece) consists of a repeated
refrain and verses derived from it. The composer drew his inspiration from two aspects
of old Irish folk music: from its modes and from the articulation of traditional fiddling.
The speech-like texture of the music is striking. Its lugubrious rhetoric moves from
heightened expression to expanded and compressed lamentation. Certain passages of
this piece, concentrated despite its extreme range and astringent intervals, recall the
devil's jagged violin passages in Stravinsky's Histoire du soldat, as if the mourners were
dispatching the deceased with a touch of schadenfreude: "We are still alive!"
Recording:
Michelle Makarski, violin
ECM New Series 1587
