scored for guitar

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duration 5 minutes 

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Memories from a Forgotten Childhood explores the disenchantment of the world: the moment when the self-evident faith of childhood slowly begins to erode. What was once clear, animated, and unconditional loses its sheen. Reality becomes more complex and layered.

 

The music moves between closeness and loss. There is an underlying tenderness, but also the awareness that this way of seeing has irrevocably passed. The present listens to the past, knowing it can no longer return to it. This tension renders the music fragile and introspective.

 

To abandon that early belief entirely would mean allowing the world to lose its enchantment for good. Remembering it from a distance, instead, carries a gentle tristesse. Toward the end, this wistfulness takes on a Ravelian melancholy: that singular moment in which beauty and sorrow coincide.

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'Memories from a Forgotten Childhood' was commissioned by Antwerp Guitar Festival. The piece served as the obligatory piece of the international guitar competition in November 2023.