For solo piano

About the work

Pensées Mélancoliques — Melancholic Thoughts — is a work for solo piano inspired by J. S. Bach’s Concerto in D minor BWV1052. Written in 2015 for the De Bach au Jazz composition competition, the piece takes its starting point from Bach while developing a distinctly personal harmonic and expressive language (Phil later re-used some of the material in ‘Manhattan Break’).

The title suggests something inward and contemplative: not a single narrative, but a succession of thoughts, memories and emotions that return, develop and transform. The music repeatedly revisits its opening material, giving the work a sense of reflection and recollection.

The music

As the work unfolds, the initial ideas become increasingly elaborate. Rapid figurations, dense harmonies and sudden changes of register create moments of agitation, while more sustained passages provide periods of repose. The writing frequently juxtaposes lyrical melodic fragments with strongly articulated harmonic gestures, giving the music a feeling of thoughts that cannot quite settle.

A particularly dramatic passage arrives towards the middle of the work, where the music becomes increasingly animated before a pronounced rallentando leads back to Tempo primo. The return of the opening character feels almost like a return to an earlier thought — familiar, but changed by everything that has happened in between.

The final pages become increasingly expansive and chromatic. The music eventually slows through a molto rallentando, with sustained sonorities and resonant pedal effects allowing the final sounds to linger rather than simply stopping.

A personal meditation on the emotional possibilities of Bach’s musical language, Pensées Mélancoliques moves between restlessness and reflection, intensity and stillness — a musical portrait of thoughts that return, change and refuse to remain entirely at rest.

Technical difficulty: Advanced
Pensées Mélancoliques requires a technically accomplished pianist, combining rapid passagework, substantial chordal writing, independent voicing, wide keyboard movement and considerable rhythmic and harmonic control. The work is suited to an experienced pianist at advanced recital level.

Performance

Score