COMPOSER’S NOTES
Tiefer und Tiefer means deeper and deeper. It changes key after every six measures, but is strictly diatonic in between. Fiddler is strictly diatonic throughout. Since the tunes seemed Irish when they occurred to me, I harmonized them mostly in fourths and fifths. Then I needed a title. My own patronymic ancestors appear to have come from a suburb of Belfast call Ballymoney. Since “The Fiddler of Ballymoney” by Getty might raise unintended nuances, I moved my ancestors a few miles away to Ballykeel. Ewig Du (Forever You), which owes much to the spirit of Schubert, was set for piano some twenty years ago. So was Ehemals (Once Upon a Time) which is more in the style of a later waltz king.