Wild Rice

About this piece

A slow, unaccompanied piece of about eight minutes, written in May 1996 for the Australian cellist David Pereira, who premiered it in Newcastle, New South Wales, that August. Kats-Chernin's note on the Boosey & Hawkes page says it grew out of hearing Pereira play new cello music, especially works from his Uluru project. She contrasts the cello's high, airy register with percussive low notes. She says two images shaped its unusually slow pace for her: an old woman hauling a sack of rice over windswept fields, and Uluru.

Technical overview

Long slurred melodies sit mostly in high treble-clef harmonics and alternate with forte pizzicato notes on the low strings. The cellist also needs glissandi to very high harmonics, a fingered-tremolo 'flutter', and deliberate overpressure ('excessive bow pressure').

Technical focus

• Harmonics
• Pizzicato
• Legato
• Dynamics
• Bow Control