(Hommage à Bártok)

Written in honor of the Béla Bartók centennial, Musiques Nocturnes is inspired by one of his most characteristic and original works, the fourth piece (by the same title), from the suite Out of Doors. Both pieces feature overlapping “night musics” – atmospheric cluster figures, sharply contrasting motifs suggesting nocturnal bird, frog, or insect sounds, and an element of human, folksong-like melody as Levinson alludes to the authentic Hungarian folksong, “Tiszan innen, Dunan tul.”