Taking as its starting point the most primitive of musical ideas, the repetition of a single note, Spike moves through many environments, rising and falling in waves of intensity – some ecstatic, some dark, some effervescent – all the while maintaining this primary impulse, tapping out a one-note rhythm.
Written at a time when I was employed as a professional multilingual arguer at a crooked exchange shop in Brussels, Spike was originally commissioned and conceived as a piano solo for Swedish virtuoso Peter Jablonski. It has also been performed by Dan Poynton, and by (the multi-talented) Dame Evelyn Glennie. As a solo this piece has been described as one for which "nothing in the piano repertoire can prepare the performer."
For this piece to have a life I had the choice of either waiting for genetic modification to produce 12-fingered pianists with increased stamina, or to transcribe the work for more than one instrument. And so Rhythm Spike – as it was originally named – became Spike, for mallet percussion and piano. I once received an e-mail message from a music student who claimed to have deciphered the morse-code messages embedded in the piece.
