DESCRIPTION:
This is a video of the premiere of "Parts Unknown" - an hour-long piano composition composed and performed by Richard Trythall. The concert took place in Rome, Italy, at the "Teatro Ghione" on December 9, 1991. Although the video is somewhat jittery, the sound is good and I am very grateful to have this document of the premiere. A subsequent performance of "Parts Unknown" in Sogna, Italy, was issued on CD by Atopos Records.

"Parts Unknown was begun in 1989 and completed in 1991. It is articulated in 12 sections:
1. Prologue - 0:00
2. Soliloquy - 9:33
3. Intermezzo - 14:25
4. Toccata - 16:05
5. Adagio - 23:05
6. Allegro - 27:30
7. Waltz - 31:45
8. Fantasy - 34:40
9. Etude - 38:06
10. Senza tempo - 42:10
11. Melodramma - 46:30
12. Night Rider - 54:15

These sections are collected in 2 groups lasting approximately 30 minutes each. It is possible to characterize the 12 individual sections according to 4 general categories - lyric narratives, dramatic fantasies, technical studies and dances. Pieces belonging to the latter two categories tend to function as "entr'acte" music in contrast to the more intensely emotional characters of the first two categories.

Although there was no clear extra-musical program in my mind while composing Parts Unknown, it is also true that I selected the notes as much for their dramatic potential as for their structural possibilities. Each piece has a clearly defined emotional character and I found that as I ordered these characters into a larger sequence, a strong sense of dramatic consequence developed among them - as if each piece were a scene in a dramatic work which, though divided in parts, was nevertheless an emotional whole. In fact, what fascinated me about creating an hour long composition was the dramatic construction - the rhythm of the emotions - in a work where composition and story telling are one and the same and where any material which serves these purposes is freely used."