Composition

A direct result of entropic increase – or decay – through time, diffusion is the universal process of order degenerating into disorder. The piece is a musical sketch of the purity of the ideal reconciling with the corrupt reality. The stark contrast between the two is like blood dissolving into water. The first encounter was painful and took time to digest. Through repeated exposures and attempts of reconciliation, however, such process of absorbing the cruelty of the world inevitably becomes more of a painless routine over time.

The piece alternates between slow unmeasured and allegro risoluto sections, both derived from the same set of motivic materials. The latter – built around the Fibonacci sequence, which relates to the pattern of growth of many things in nature – dissolves itself again and again after coming in as a catastrophic horror almost obsessively. On another level, dissolution and diffusion play key roles in determining the piece’s structure especially in the slow sections, where their progression is dependent on the decay of tones and their diffusion into the soundscape. Despite the apparent resilient calmness any dramatic outbursts dissolve into, the overall timbre of the piece is transformed. By the last time the allegro returns, it ceases to be a surprise.