"In Latin, reverso means to go back the opposite way. I have long been interested in what I call inverse forms. Extenso and my String Quartet no.4 (1996) already examined this question in considerable depth. One looks at an object (even a sound-object . . .) and moves around it. One displaces it a little, observes it obliquely, changes the angle of vision. Then one’s perception is automatically modified and the form is transformed. Because a form is first and foremost what is deformed.

Reverso is the only piece composed in linked movements. Or, more precisely, in tempos. Four articulated, folding panels of time, like the wings of some unlikely bird. This music was composed by means of an incessant recovery of the after which returns to the before only to graft itself once more onto the after, and so on. For example, the beginning was writing itself while I was writing the end; but not quite that, since the end could not be decided without first composing the beginning and vice versa.

This is a writing of the after towards the before which constantly goes on ahead again. From right to left, if you like. This is more than mere wordplay. The form of Reverso is deployed through successive and persistent refoldings, unfoldings and foldings of the melody which is heard played calmly by the strings at the beginning of movement 2 of the piece. This line, at once calm and sombre, is progressively engulfed by fluxes of varying speeds and colours, all driven by specific dynamisms. Reverso is the longest of the solos. It occurs at the cardinal point of the cycle, where it is possible to apprehend its properties as a whole."

Pascal Dusapin

Translation: Charles Johnston

For 4 flutes (also piccolo), 4 oboes (also cor anglais), 4 clarinets (also bass clarinet), 4 bassoons (also contrabassoon), 6 horns, 4 trumpets, 4 trombones, tuba, 3 percussionists, timpani (pair), harp, strings