Kelly-Marie Murphy: Star Burning Blue

Canadian composer Kelly-Marie Murphy's Star Burning Blue was commissioned by Honens International Piano Competition for 1996 First Laureate Maxim Philippov. The work, which lasts approximately eight minutes, is in a single movement, and roughly depicts the life cycle of a main sequence, supergiant star. Main sequence stars such as the sun make up nine out of every ten stars we see from earth. Some supergiant stars have a high luminosity and shine with a blue light, indications of their high temperature. The strong gravity of the massive star attracts more and more matter, giving it greater mass. This in turn increases the star's gravitational influence and the rate at which it can gather more matter. The bigger the blue star becomes, the brighter it shines and the faster it burns its nuclear fuel until the inevitable stellar explosion. The cycle then begins again with the remnants of the supernova.

Star Burning Blue explores a musical cycle of power and energy. Stability spins out of control and is then regained. The tempo increases, the range becomes more and more extreme. When the shattering finally happens, time is slowed as high energy fragments rush out into the vacuum. Ironically this peaceful moment is created by violent destruction. As the particles of music drift, they are caught eventually in their mutual attraction and coalesce once again.