Prolepsis II for solo clarinet
Duration: 4 minutes

Score
Audio (performed by Christine Bellomy)

By definition, a prolepsis is "the representation of a thing as existing before it actually does or did so, as in 'If you tell the cops, you're a dead man!'" In the field of rhetoric, it is "the anticipation and answering of possible objections in rhetorical speech." In the first half of Prolepsis II for unaccompanied Bb clarinet, musical ideas are likewise anticipated, foreshadowed, and interrupted by other musical events. These various ideas come into conflict with one another, each vying for musical space. In the second half of the piece, something of a synthesis occurs, but it is a synthesis against the will of the individual ideas, the result being an internal struggle that never truly reaches an acceptance of synthesis. Prolespsis II is now in its third version, the first being for solo bassoon, the second being for also sax.

Performances

—November 13, 2005: University of Iowa
—February 24, 2006: University of Illinois (Urbana-Champagne), Midwest Composers Symposium