The origin of this piece is a poem by Philippe Jaccottet dedicated to Henry Purcell*, written in September 1981 after a James Bowman concert at Saint-Julien-le-Pauvre. It was requested for the baroque organ at Auch Cathedral.
The fact that Henry Purcell is an exact contemporary of the organ at the Auch Cathedral Basilica, as well as the very particular colour of Purcell's music (I am thinking of the laments for countertenor, especially O Solitude, with organ and bass viol) inspired me to focus my work around this musician. Philippe Jaccottet's poem is a superb meditation on this music, evoking the voice which is «mingling…with the stars» and the harp, related to the lyre (with Lyra being a constellation in our Solar Systems) «for which Vega is a blue key». This is where the work's title, Véga, comes
from: the star and keystone of the poem.
In an attempt to break a certain tradition of writing for the organ, I tried to privilege the very singular sounds of this baroque organ, while at the same time indicating other options of writing for a classical organ. The present version is one of a number of possible versions of this piece, which can then take on a totally different colour depending on the instrument on which it is performed. The flageolet (an instrument rarely played) evokes here the «rungs of glass» which Philippe Jaccottet talks of, and gives the work unreal contours where the tone continually blurs the thread of the discourse.
The transcription for two microtonal accordions also contributes to the interstellar character of this piece.
* To Henry Purcell from Pensées sous les nuages, Bloodaxe Books, 1994.
