The concerto opens without ceremony of any kind. The soloist is simply there, playing, some while before the listener has finished settling—a habit carried over from the First Concerto, where it was likewise described as a structural decision and likewise arrived at by not writing an introduction.

The movement's business is to say plainly what the piece is made of, and it discharges that business early and then has a further two minutes to fill, which it fills. Dr. Trevelyan-Boake describes the resulting stretch as "a period of consolidation." The composer has called it "the part where I was thinking."

Everything the remaining five movements will spend the next twenty minutes disagreeing with is present here, in order, and unguarded.

Back to Xylophone Concerto #2.