Checkmate! is a short concerto for solo piano and orchestra composed by Maxime Goulet. The piece contains six short melodic themes, each of them representing a specific chess piece: king, queen, bishop, rook, knight, pawn. These short themes are played at the beginning of the work, to introduce them to the audience. The full work is based exclusively on the use of these six themes, alternating between the orchestra and the piano. The sequence of themes follows the chess moves of the famous game played on February 10th, 1996, in Philadelphia, by Garry Kasparov against Deep Blue, a computer developed by IBM. For the first time in history, a chess-playing computer defeated a reigning world champion. The piano part is based on Kasparov’s moves (the black pieces) and the orchestra part is based on those of Deep Blue (the white pieces). Of course, during the piece, the piano and orchestra will often play at the same time. However, whoever is playing the “chess move” will always remain in the foreground with one of the main themes.
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