I love them all, so this was hard. Barque is something I intermittently practice, and it's so fun (to try to) play. I'm really hoping to be ready for this set in a year or two. The sound world of Noctuelles is fascinating to me--a combination of the four against three and the harmony always makes it sound a little like Scriabin, but more controlled and narrative. I picked Oiseaux Tristes for mostly personal reasons. I got interested in "classical" music through the avant-garde first of all, and when I started I had no personal conception of melody, only catchy semi-atmospheric motifs. When I first heard this piece it felt like what I was striving for in my fledgling compositions, with the recurring birdsong and harmony and drama, so I was stunned that something like this existed. I think it points in another direction in music, when music is generally conceived melodically or harmonically--paving the way for composers like Sciarrino to really focus on interesting figures/figurations that act both harmonically and melodically and whose recurrence structures a work.