FOUR x FOUR Scelsi
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Quatro pezzi su una nota sola
by Giacinto Scelsi (1959)
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2021
MICHEL LORAND – MUSIQUES NOUVELLES
FILM
Four x Four brings together two films: the first one based on Giacinto Scelsi’s Quatro pezzi su una nota sola (1959) written for a mixed instrumental ensemble of 25 instruments, and the second one based on John Cage’s string quartet Four (1983). Both pieces are part of a circular conception of music. “To find is to turn, to go round”, says Maurice Blanchot in the Entretien infini: “To find, to seek, to turn: yes, these are words indicating movements, but always circular ones. To find is to seek the relationship to the centre, which is properly the untraceable. The centre makes it possible to find and turn, but the centre cannot be found.”
The two pieces filmed are therefore inscribed in a circle.
In Giacinto Scelsi’s Quatro pezzi su una nota sola, the 25 musicians are arranged in a circle round the camera. According to the 4 pieces of the piece, the film is built on 4 rotating movements from a fixed point, the centre of the circle. In John Cage’s Quartet Four, the camera literally rotates round the four musicians of the quartet who face each other in the centre of the circle.
These two films dialogue and question the notions of centre and of circular movement.
For the first part of the film Four x Four – Giacinto Scelsi, the camera is in the centre of the 25 musicians arranged in a circle round it. The camera rotates on its fixed 360° axis in a time frame dictated by the musical composition.There are four movements. The camera turns around itself four times in a clockwise direction.
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