Works
Giacinto Scelsi
Hyxos (1955)
for Flute in g and Percussionist
Length: 15:00
Hyxos is inspired by the Greek term (hyksos) used by Manetone of Sebennito (the most important Egyptian historian to write in Greek in the 3rd century before Christ and high priest in Heliopolis at the time of Ptolemy Philadelpho in his "History of Egypt", of which only a few reconstructions are extant, to describe the Asian invaders known as "shepherd kings" who invaded and dominated Egypt at the end of the XVIII century BC and who represented the 15th and 16th dynasty until they were driven out in the XVI century BC. In Hyxos, written in 1955, Scelsi used the flute in G and a percussion section made up of ritual instruments like the little bell and two gongs, with functions of rhythmic punctuation and timbric shading. At the beginning of the second piece the beli marks out a binary beat in regular quavers, whilst the flute is required to step aver the strong beats using syncopations and tied notes, almost as though following a different metrical law. While in this episode the bell is used both with soft and wooden sticks, the gong, one of Scelsi's favourite instruments, is used in no fewer than four different ways: in the third movement, scored for a series of timbric variations all set at the same pitch (D), the gong is first struck on its side, then with a wooden stick first and then a metal stick, an operation which produces variations in resonance and quite subtle sound spectra.
Maria Girardi
Translation by Tim Shaw
In Hyxos CD published by AGORA' Musica - 2001