ROCK SONATA No.2

for Solo Piano 1973

David Hellewell

The Rock Sonatas came into being directly from the already-extended pieces such as ‘Land of Fire’, ‘Crazy Calypso’, ‘Primitiv’ and ‘D.J. Blues’. But the final impulse that triggered-off Rock Sonata No.1 was the promptings of a particular student who, having master these four works, as well as the earlier ones, was ready to extend himself even more. Mister D would try to show him ideas by extemporising in a sort of baroque/rock style, but as the student found it impossible to do this himself, Mister D decided to write a piece incorporating these elements. Thus the Rock Sonata was born.

Rock Sonata No.2 is the most ‘Classical’ of the Rock Sonatas. The piece opens in classical style, simply but rhythmic. In these larger pieces there are, as in classical music, much longer phrase and progressions, and also long, accumulating crescendos and sudden dynamic changes of mood and expression: in other words, as in classical music, the expression becomes as important as the notes.

At [B] there is a complete change of style - a heavy jazz-funk passage. Now here’s a problem: The melody is written ‘straight’, in duple time, but needs to be played ‘jazzy’ ie. in (nearly!) compound time. In this instance Mister D has been stumped as to writing it down to be played exactly as written, because, in fact, it needs to be played/felt, in between the two times, This is the jazz/swing feel. It should be noted that one of the main differences between Jazz and Rock is that Jazz is played (but not written!) in compound time, whereas Rock and Latin- American is in duple time.

At [C] there is another contrast; a ‘Lightly Funky’ passage with a spiky bass. This leads into a real ‘Classical-Rock’ section marked Sonorous. ‘Classical-Rock’ because it uses a well-known chord progression common to both pop and classical music music, but extended by heavy syncopation and rhythm. The bass is like a bass guitar, and the right hand is split into melody and accompaniment. The ‘Sleazy’ figure at [D] is another little jazz-funk ‘riff’ (a repeated figure), ‘cool’ but rhythmic.

These then are the elements of the sonata, which are then developed, extended and expanded, both emotionally and musically, into a substantial Classical-Jazz-Rock piece for concert performance. At the end of the piece the last chord is held until the sounds die away - to hear the harmonics.