Landscape/Soundscape I for two grand pianos

Collected in the music CD New Music for Multiple Keyboards, Landscape/Soundscape I for two grand pianos, by Michael Hannan, and performed by Michael Hannan and Diana Blom, makes scant use of the keyboard, opting instead to make sounds directly on the strings and other parts of the piano. This approach has been for a long-time part of Hannan’s practice as a musician. The work is in three movements each with three sections. The first and third movements are very resonant because the sustain pedals are depressed throughout them, whereas the central movement has a dryer sound with the sustain pedal released. This dryer-sound section uses a sound-producing technique that Hannan has employed in various live and recorded interpretations of Sculthorpe’s Landscape: that is, the bouncing of numerous wine corks dangling on lengths of fibrous string upon the metal of the piano.