You See Where This Is Going

You See Where This Is Going is a setting of a poem by Brendan Constantine about the flower you must never name (in American poetry.) I found an equation that was named rhodonea by the 18th century Italian mathematician Guido Grandi because its plot resembles a rose. If n is odd, the rose is n-petalled. If n is even, the rose is 2n-petalled. I used this equation to create the music that is played by the pizzicato strings, but it’s actually in the spaces between those events where the piece unfolds.

Maybe the piece is about how naming things obscures them, representing them (and us) as something quite other than what we are, and there’s a kind of imposter syndrome we feel by not being able to live into all the implications of our names.

You See Where This Is Going was written for my beloved friends loadbang (baritone singer, clarinet, trumpet, trombone) and string ensemble with the generous support of another beloved friend and colleague Vittoria Chierici, one of whose rose paintings is the image you see above.

You can visit February 23rd in my ongoing project A Book of Days to hear and see the premiere recording with video by Luke DuBois.

For performing materials, please click the buy button below.