Work Overview

• Publication Year: 1949
• First Publisher: Editions Salabert
• Instrumentation: Piano Solo
• Total Performance Time: 2 minutes 30 seconds

Completed in Rome in March 1949, this is one of the works composed by Damase during his studies abroad, having won the Grand Prix de Rome at the age of 19 (1947). It is dedicated to his former teacher at the Conservatoire de Paris, Professor Armand Ferté (1881-1973). From Ferté's piano class, besides Damase, Germaine Mounier, Pierre Barbizet, and Daniel-Lesur also emerged.

It is a three-page miniature piece written in Allegro moderato, C major, 4/4 time, and in a free form. As the title suggests, continuous single-note sixteenth-note movements are played by one hand, and sometimes by both hands, without interruption. The clear and smooth movement, beginning in C major, gradually undergoes subtle transformations, freely traversing the keyboard up and down with complex accidentals and irregular leaps, expressing an exhilarating sense of weightlessness. It demands mechanical independence of the five fingers and complete homogeneity between the left and right hands, appearing to condense the advanced pianism that Damase and his teacher Ferté excelled in. It received its broadcast premiere by the composer himself on radio in 1949.