In 1979 Lutoslawski initiated a new stylistic period with a memorial piece, "Epitaph for oboe & piano." In 1980 Lutoslawski had occasion to write another such short piece, this time dedicated to the memory of Stefan Jarocinski (1912-1980), an almost exact contemporary who was a leading musicologist and critic and a champion of Lutoslawski's music. Since Jarocinski's most famous work was a book on the French composer Debussy and expressed particular admiration for the forest scene in that composer's opera, Pelléas et Mélisande, Lutoslawski based this piece on the rising phrase D-A-G-A from the opera's Forest Scene, and on the interval pair of a fifth and a second which it comprises. The music is consistently haunting, is built on projection of the cello solo against harmonies in the piano, and ends with a final chord of Debussian flavor low in the piano while the cello concludes with a D-G-A distillation of the main motive. In 1982 Lutoslawski made an arrangement of the piece replacing the piano with a string orchestra of seven violins, three violas, two cellos, and bass.



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