Efstratios Minakakis: Anacharsis I (2010)

for Bohlen-Pierce clarinet, dumbek and violin

Anacharsis was a 6^th-century Scythian philosopher who traveled to Solon’s Athens. The first foreigner to receive Athenian citizenship, he was highly regarded for his study of Greek institutions and was reputedly an outspoken advocate of restraint and moderation. The personage of Anacharsis is used as a metaphor referring to the interlocution between two different ‘pitch cultures’, represented by the two different intonation systems used in the Bohlen-Pierce clarinet and the violin parts. One is attempting to ‘translate’ the language of the other, while the dumbek comments on and regulates their mutual exchanges.