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About the Score

Ashes & Dreams is a 7-song (plus introduction) composed for HAVEN Trio based on Japanese poetry. The poems alternate between haiku, the short, aphoristic philosophical poems written by men and the more effusive, emotional poems written in the 31 syllable waka form by anonymous female poets. While the male poets speak of eternal concerns of life and death, the women poets sing of matters of their hearts. The haiku songs are written in a succinct musical style which matches the nuanced gestures and delicate imagery of the poems. The waka songs are more expansive and heartfelt, with richly colored musical textures and lyrical vocal lines. The waka accompaniments are more reminiscent of traditional art-songs and musical theatre pieces. My dramatic image is of a man and a woman --- the man speaks a carefully refined, meticulously haiku, then, after listening to the man, the woman retreats to her personal chamber where she unwraps her tightly bound public face and society’s garments and allows her personal feelings to flow, unbound. The cycle is a dramatic tour-de-force for soprano Lindsay Kesselman and her colleagues. As the third piece written for HAVEN by this composer, the idiomatic writing pays special tribute to the uniquely expressive and musical talents of this ensemble. Premiered by HAVEN TRIO (Lindsay Kesselman, soprano, Kimberly Cole Luevano, clarinet, Midori Koga, piano), Toronto, Ontario, Canada

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