Seven



Category: Musical composition
Dated: New York City, May 1988
Instrumentation: Parts without score for flute, clarinet, percussion, piano, violin, viola and violoncello
Duration: 20'
Premiere and performer(s): November 18, 1988 by the Boston Musica Viva
Dedicated to: for the Boston "Musica Viva", "The Voices of Change" in Dallas and "Continuum" in New York
Choreography: ---
Published: Edition Peters 67227 © 1988 by Henmar Press
Manuscript: Notes (holograph in black and red ink - 1 p. Folder 775); Worksheets and sketches (holograph in ink - 4 lvs. Folder 776); Parts for flute, clarinet and piano, performance notes (holograph, signed, in ink - 9 p. Folder 777); 7 parts (galley proofs with holograph and copyist's annotations - 16 lvs. Folder 1068), all in New York Public Library


Seven consists of twenty time-brackets, nineteen of which are flexible (with respect to beginning and ending) and one of them fixed. The fixed timebrackets are different ones for each part.
The duration of all time-brackets is the same, with one exception in each part. The numbers of sounds in a time-bracket is different: one in the parts for flute, clarinet and percussion, between one to three for the violin, viola and cello parts and between three to five (per staff) in the piano part.
The sounds for the percussion part are chosen by the performer. In the percussion part, the notation uses numbers, indicating which instrument to play.

Sources: Paul van Emmerik: Thema's en Variaties; David Revill: The Roaring Silence; New York Public Library online catalog; Stefan Schädler / Walter Zimmerman (Ed.): Anarchic Harmony; David Revill: The Roaring Silence; Paul van Emmerik: Liner notes for Hat Art CD 2-6192; Rob Haskins: "An Anarchic Society of Sounds": The Number Pieces of John Cage