Composer: David Heuser Instrumentation: woodwind quintet (flute, oboe, clarinet, horn, bassoon) Year Composed: 2023 Duration: 23 minutes Pages (score): 62
Cost: Purchase: $45.00
Movements:
I. Luminous dark birds, perched on lamps of water, guarding our dreams
II. Speaking the glyph of plants
III. Time corroded by its own clocks
IV. The squirrels of forgetfulness
V. The place on the circle where everything crosses in time at the bottom of sleep
The titles of the movements of Insomnia come from four different poems by the poet Olga Cabral (1909-1997). The opening movement's title comes primarily from her 1976 poem House of the Poet, but I stole the "luminous dark birds" part from a later poem of hers (The Scream). House of the Poet also provided the title for movement III, again with some minor adjustments to the line. The poem The Meadow (homage to Paul Klee) (1976) provided the title for movements II and V. The fourth movement's title comes from the poem which also provided the title for the work as a whole, Insomnia (1980):
With the pallor of butterflies locked in ice
the moon walks grandly down the staircase
the stars buckle themselves in for the night
the squirrels of forgetfulness
run here, run there
looking for black peonies
I lie lightly over the whole earth
and cover it with my body
like snow.
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