brianfending.com

I recently submitted my first work for the annual 60x60 Project, a collaborative affair where the jury selects 60 works (from 60 composers), each up to 60 seconds in length. The selection of works culminates in a 60 minute sound collage. [The format is strikingly similar to the format of some improv work I did with Gray Code in Washington, DC back in the 1990's, and is part of why it resonates with me.]

Anyway, my work was Resistance Redux 10 Jun 1940 / 8 Aug 1942, written specifically for the Project. From my submission form:

On 10 Jun 1940, Benito Mussolini delivered his Declaration of War on France and England, an impassioned call to arms for the Fascist state. Just two years later, on 8 Aug 1942, Mahatma Ghandi delivered his famous Quit India speech rallying against British Imperialism, and ending with the pledge, “At a time when I may have to launch the biggest struggle of my life, I may not harbour hatred against anybody.” Resistance Redux is a treatment of the most substantive text of both speeches, and is a study in both the obvious contrasts and subtle similarities.

Here's the text of each speach snippet (spoken by computer simultaneously and filtered using a mathematical sequence modeled after the timeline of WW II), with Ghandi's last sentence (being a longer snippet) acting as finale.

Mussolini

Recent historical events can be summarized in the following phrases: promises, threats, blackmail, and finally to crown the edifice, the ignoble seige by the fifty-two states of the League of Nations. Our conscience is absolutely tranquil. With you the entire world is witness that Fascist Italy has done all that is humanly possible to avoid the torment which is throwing Europe into turmoil; but all was in vain. It would have sufficed to revise the treaties to bring them up to date with the changing needs of the life of nations and not consider them untouchable for eternity; it would have sufficed not to have begun the stupid policy of guarantees, which has shown itself particularly lethal for those who accepted them; it would have sufficed not to reject the proposal that the Fuhrer made on 6 October of last year after having finished the campaign in Poland.

Ghandi

I know the British Government will not be able to withhold freedom from us, when we have made enough self-sacrifice. We must, therefore, purge ourselves of hatred. Speaking for myself, I can say that I have never felt any hatred. As a matter of fact, I feel myself to be a greater friend of the British now than ever before. One reason is that they are today in distress. My very friendship, therefore, demands that I should try to save them from their mistakes. As I view the situation, they are on the brink of an abyss. It, therefore, becomes my duty to warn them of their danger even though it may, for the time being, anger them to the point of cutting off the friendly hand that is stretched out to help them. People may laugh, nevertheless that is my claim. At a time when I may have to launch the biggest struggle of my life, I may not harbor hatred against anybody.

The two narratives strike me as point and counterpoint in this study in contrasts, written by men with world views so diametrically opposed, spoken just years apart... but we could envision hearing each at vastly different times in human history. Oppression as theme, struggle as motif, method as differentiator. And the noise of the world befalling each three times (listen to the work) before they are silenced.