Listening to nature

Trees have found their way into the music of composer Melody Eötvös for as long as she can remember. 

How Pine Cones Fall in Perfect Circles, is a solo guitar work written for guitarist Ken Murray and inspired by trees of the Iberian conifer forests. Shivelight, a trio for piano, horn and violin, commissioned for the Quercus Trio. Quercus is, of course, the botanical name for the oak tree, and shivelight is a word coined by the poet Gerard Manley Hopkins to describe the shafts of light that filter through the foliage and canopies of trees. And now there’s Regnare, written for pianist Aura Go, cellist Tipi Valve and violinist Kristian Winther to play in Musica Viva Australia’s upcoming Beethoven’s Ghost tour.

Regnare – ‘to rule’ in Latin – refers to Eucalyptus Regnans, the Mountain Ash, a broad-leafed evergreen which towers over eucalypt forests in Victoria and Tasmania. The Mountain Ash is vulnerable to bush fires, but it also needs them to regenerate, only releasing its seeds after fire has cleared a gap in the canopy. 

‘Looking at these trees gives an example of a better way to do things,’ says Eötvös. ‘It's about endurance, not about domination. I capture that musically through the energy, how I deal with motives and themes and bring them back to grow and be sustainable.’ 

One of the ways Eötvös creates a distinctive voice is through the expanded palette of timbre, of textures and sound colours she has discovered through her work with electronics and synthetically-generated music while studying for a doctorate at Indiana University. 

‘It completely changed the way I then was writing for acoustic music. You can make any sound at all when you're working with electronics. It can be as high as you want. It can be as low as you want. It can be scratchy and clicky and noisy and sonorous. It just exploded the options.

‘Then, naturally, I ended up pulling those sounds back into my acoustic music. Timbrally, that's when my acoustic music really expanded. I realized it doesn't have to just be about pitches, harmony and melody. Embracing and working, even structurally, with timbre and how it changes and evolves across the piece is a massive part of my focus in composition now.’  

‘In House of the Beehives, written for Inventi Ensemble (Melissa Dakey and Ben Opie), I had the flute and the oboe material recorded, and then pulled it into the DAW, the digital audio workstation, and manipulated it to the point where you almost can't recognize it. It sounds like you're processing it, live, at the same time as the acoustic instruments are playing. So using the instruments and manipulating recordings of the actual oboe and flute bridges the gap between electronic and acoustic. It ends up melding together and becoming a completely different beast because, as soon as you've got the electronics in there, you're working with unlimited resources. I love it.’ 

Regnare, by contrast, is written for that most traditional of ensembles, a piano trio. It is the second time Eötvös’ has written for this combination but she admits that it can still be intimidating writing for such an ensemble. Imagine – your new work, played by some of Australia’s leading artists, and sandwiched between masterpieces by Beethoven and Ravel. 

‘It's a tricky thing to navigate’, she says,’ ‘because of the tradition behind it, as well as your knowledge of the instruments and how you can write for piano and for the string instruments. Everything's exposed. It's challenging to weave it together in a way that's going to be sustainable across the entire piece without it falling into cliché or underusing or overusing instruments.’ 

Fortunately, a deep understanding of the instruments – she has played both cello and piano from an early age – and her friendship with the musicians makes the challenge do-able.

‘Tipi, Kristian and Aura all advocated for me to write this piece for them as an ensemble, so I know that they have confidence in the music that I write, my style and who I am as a composer.’

She reflects for a moment on what it feels like to hear a work for the first time, and her face lights up.

‘I'm just going to be over the moon about it. I already know this, regardless of what happens in the rehearsal. Just elation, joy, excitement.’

You can hear Regnare in Adelaide, Brisbane, Canberra, Melbourne, Newcastle, Perth and Sydney from 5-14 May 2026.