Abstract
Bower: Keobeu Nolae, the latter part meaning "curving song" in Korean, is inspired by Kate Fagan's poem "Bower" about the curving sonic beauty of bowerbirds in nature as a type of natural retreat within East Coast Australian bush touching eternity, away from the negative in life. In this sense the structure is a type of parabola curve moving symmetrically from stillness accruing to frantic bluesy movement of multiple motifs, before falling back to stillness. Formally, the structure is viewed as: A B A' B' C [a' b' c] B'' A''. It's content uses various nonghyeon bending techniques of the gayageum with string pressing techniques on chords and appoggiatura notes, arpeggios, and alternating patterns at the climax, with more distilled sounds flanking this through bellbird like harmonics woven amidst Korean Buddhist Temple bowl resonances and Judeo-Christian glossolalia-prayerful chanting-to suggest the eternal, whilst fragments of the bowerbird poem are whispered as a type of nesting thread throughout the music. The music becomes a sonic nest with symbols of spirit amidst glistening nonghyeon colour changes to suggest the curving song of nature.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Place of Publication | Grosvenor Place, N.S.W. |
| Publisher | Australian Music Centre |
| Edition | 2022 |
| Size | 1 facsimile score, 9 pages |
| Publication status | Published - 2022 |