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She Who Sleeps With a Small Blanket: each Composer: Volans Kevin
Programme Note
She Who Sleeps With A Small Blanket was written for Robyn Schulkowsky and she first performed it in Salzburg in October 1985. Robyn had been percussionist in my earlier pieces for harpsichords and rattles and it was obvious from her incessant drumming on tables during the breaks in rehearsals, that neither her talents nor energies were being fully utilised.
This piece has often been mistakenly associated with African drumming. However the only overtly African thing about this piece is the title, which implies 'she who sleeps alone', ie. without a lover. I wrote it as a virtuoso showpiece for the player as well as a composition study for myself. After some interim versions I decided to limit the instrumentation to drums only, with a brief coda on marimba. I explored several different kinds of patterning, the principal one being cross-rhythms in triplets played with two sticks.
