A very long time ago, Helen and Eleanor Wong asked me to write a short piece for two pianos for them to be performed at a conservatoire in Canton – I met them when I was a student at the Royal Academy of Music. The piece is called Pentatonic Study.

prefer the Japanese pentatonic scale (do-mi-fa-la-ti) which has the augmented 4th and minor 2nd intervals (watch Sakura Variations). Chinese pentatonic (do- re-mi-sol-la) appears lacking in dissonance.  As a small child in Hong Kong, I encountered Cantonese opera and noticed performers employing non-well tempered tuning, tone fluctuation, glissando ... and freely modifying existing music of any genre to make it their own. All these liberated Cantonese opera from the confines of Chinese pentatonic. When I compose pentatonic music I prefer writing for the voice and/or instruments that can bend pitches (watch Four Songs). At the time of writing the work, few Western Classical musicians would modify existing music to make it their own. The piano is well-tempered. A way to expand the sound from this restriction is using the sustaining pedal liberally and long pedalling, allowing all strings to vibrate in sympathy creating nuances akin to water colour. Also, I allow freely changing the tempo and rubato for personal expression. Instead of finding two matching pianos I would encourage the use of two pianos of different qualities, even to include a prepared piano to add contrasts. The markings in the music are only suggestions and can be ignored to explore your own. If you would like to use my score as a prototype to re-create, I would be delighted to hear a recording of the result.