Melia Watras

MELIA WATRAS: SPHERE
for two violins (2024)

World Premiere: Michael Jinsoo Lim, violins (recording); June 18-August 18, 2024, The Quartet by Ron Arad installed in the Royal Academy of Arts Summer Exhibition 2024; London, England

Duration: 4:53

Program Notes:
Sphere was written for the celebrated artist, industrial and architectural designer Ron Arad’s installation, The Quartet, at the Royal Academy Exhibition Summer 2024, in London.

I was honored to be part of a musical creative team that included Atar Arad, Steven Isserlis, Igor Polesitsky, David Waterman, Helena Winkelman and Tabea Zimmermann. We were each asked to contribute a musical composition or improvisation as a response to music fragments discovered in the Jewish Ghetto in Florence, Italy. The resulting recordings where then incorporated into Ron Arad’s multimedia work in which two violins, a viola and a cello, with no instrumentalists present, play music through the vibrations of the instruments.

The Quartet project was managed by Michael Castellana with expert acoustic input from luthier Stefan-Peter Greiner.

For this installation, my composition was recorded by Michael Jinsoo Lim, who played both violin parts.

—Melia Watras