There is a problem with Luigi Nono: too little of his earlier music is generally available for most of us to be able to judge whether the rather daunting austerity of his later works is justified—that is, inevitable—or merely wilful. Austerity in itself need not be daunting, of course, but it threatens to become so in Nono mainly because the works are long. No Webernian or Scelsian brevity here. ''Hy que caminar'' sognando plays for 20 minutes, La lontananza nostalgica utopica futura for twice that length.
La lontananza, completed in the year before Nono's death in 1990, is subtitled ''Madrigal for several 'travellers'''. Little of the singing quality originally pertaining to 'madrigal' survives, but travelling, particularly in the sense of motion between Gidon Kremer's 'live' playing and the material on tape, is more evident, and more positive, the predominant tendency to fragmentation relieved at times by the composer's acknowledgement that virtuosity remains a viable mode of expression, and that a 'big sound' need not be synonymous with romantic (nostalgic?) selfindulgence.
The effect of the piece owes much to the evident commitment of Kremer, recorded with special presence, and resonance. The work for violin duo also allows for the ability of such a star player to assert a presence and a personality, bridging the silences with brittle but often forceful gestures and even, in the final stages, arriving at a more sustained style as the music seeks out the instruments' lowest register. Several of Nono's late works refer to a statement found on a Toledo mural which amounts to the assertion that travellers must keep on the move even if no paths can be found. Nono was certainly a determined traveller, courageous in the sense that he kept working even when he seemed unsure about how to communicate his thoughts to others.'