Spike (Preview)

Spike (1998)
Spike was originally Rhythm Spike, commissioned by Creative New Zealand as a solo piano
work for Swedish concert pianist Peter Jablonski. It was premiered by Jablonski at the
1994 New Zealand International Festival of the Arts, in Wellington, New Zealand and
has also been performed as a piano solo by Dame Evelyn Glennie. This arrangement for
marimba, vibraphone and piano was completed in 1998.
The composer writes:
“Written at a time when I was employed as a professional multilingual arguer at a crooked
exchange shop in Brussels, Spike, as a solo piece, has been described as a one for which
‘nothing in the piano repertoire can prepare the performer’.
For this piece to have a life I had the choice of either waiting for genetic modification
to produce twelve-fingered pianists with increased stamina, or to transcribe the work
for more than one instrument. And so Rhythm Spike — as it was originally named —
became Spike, for mallet percussion and piano. Taking as its starting point the most
primitive of musical ideas — the repetition of a single note — Spike moves through many
environments, rising and falling in waves of intensity, some ecstatic, some dark, some
effervescent, all the while maintaining this primary impulse, tapping out a one-note
rhythm. I once received an e-mail message from a music student who claimed to have
deciphered the Morse code messages embedded in the piece.”
Spike received its premiere performance from Brian Resnick (marimba, vibraphone)
and Stephen Gosling (piano) at the The Juilliard School, New York, USA on 21 February
1999. A recording of Spike, also performed by Resnick and Gosling, appears on the Rattle
Records album John Psathas – Rhythm Spike (RAT-D008), alongside Psathas’ Drum Dances
(PE008) and Stream 3.
PE019 – v