Jeney Selfquotations

The title of the chamber piece Self-Quotations already carries the danger of sentimental retrospect. Of course, Jeney rejects this possibility: he summarizes the confrontation with his own career so far not in a large-format composition intended to be representative, but in a chamber work written for five instruments. Self-control and the tension that comes with it is also manifested in the fact how he highlights the self-quotations from their original environment, completely transforms them, and, as if they were just found objects, is preoccupied with what he can do with them. Distancing oneself from erupting emotions is associated with playfulness in the Self-Quotations. The playfulness in Jeney's work can be grasped in a variety of compositional processes, all of which call attention to the fact that in this retrospective work the composer was primarily concerned with how to construct a composition from as few and simple musical elements as possible. (Anna Dalos)