Lament

2009
/
Chamber Works

Details

Category

Chamber Works

librettist

WordS by

instrumentation

Flute, Horn, Bass, and Piano

duration

7'

commissioned by

premiered by

Fifth House Ensemble

Purchase Score

Lament is about struggle and failure. It opens with every instrument intoning an F, as loudly as possible in extreme registers, as if trying to make a stand and create a foundation on which to build - but they cannot. Even this simplest of gestures fails with the notes gradually falling by a semitone to E. This becomes a theme throughout the piece. Episodes follow in which the music attempts to build something, but repeatedly fails. Eventually the struggle gives way to a lament for this failure.

1
cOMPONENT divider

Lament

Purchase Score
duration

7'

instrumentation

Flute, Horn, Bass, and Piano

premiered by

Fifth House Ensemble

commissioned by

Lament

Lament is about struggle and failure. It opens with every instrument intoning an F, as loudly as possible in extreme registers, as if trying to make a stand and create a foundation on which to build - but they cannot. Even this simplest of gestures fails with the notes gradually falling by a semitone to E. This becomes a theme throughout the piece. Episodes follow in which the music attempts to build something, but repeatedly fails. Eventually the struggle gives way to a lament for this failure.

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