Ice Man
for solo piano
(1993)
duration: 33’
GRT • 018
CD available
Greenbaum Hindson
Peterson
Glenn Riddle, piano
GHP9501
(mov.2)
First
Light
Yvonne Lau, piano
Fellowship of Australian Composers
(mov.1, The
Moon),
audio sample
The
Dream ( from
mov.2)
score
available from
Promethean Editions
program note
Ice
Man is a
programmatic work in three movements. It can be further
divided up into nine sections which are based on the plight
of James Scott, the Australian student who was trapped in
the Himalayan snow for 43 days before being rescued. When I
first read about him in a newspaper article it moved me
greatly and I felt that I would like to write a piece of
music based on his story. After much initial trouble I
eventually came to the conclusion that it was impossible
for me to write a piece of music which reflected James
Scott's feelings. The piece is actually about my feelings;
about how I feel about the idea of being in his
predicament.
In selecting 9 fragments of text from the newspaper
article, I was primarily looking for the philosophical
strands: the acceptance of misfortune, the wait in hope,
the possibility of death and the change of expectation. I
am less interested in the geographical prison, the hunger,
the cold and the eventual rescue than in the attitudes
which these circumstances inspire in people. In this way
the piece is not only about James Scott but about courage
in general. James Scott's ordeal just happened to be a
particularly memorable instance of human courage.
The 9 fragments represent a psychological journey. I have
set them in the order in which they happened but their
durations are not in proportion to normal 'calendar' time.
They say that when a person is dying their life flashes
before their eyes. It seems to me that James Scott went
through this process in slow motion. But there were also
weeks that passed almost without incident (at least to his
memory) and these extremes of 'fast' and 'slow' motion are
at the core of my piece. This has not always translated
into external speed of a section but in the sense of 'time
passing' which they respectively convey.
article
available on resources
page
review
"...Greenbaum's
music; there's real poetry in it, especially in the simple
delicacy of Ice
Man."
Andrew Ford, 24 Hours, January 1997