longing for peace in the garden of lost children
Evan Chambers 2005
Duration: 9'
Program note:
In her book When Things Fall Apart, Pema Chödrön writes: “The father of a two-year-old talks about turning on the television and unexpectedly seeing the bombing…in Oklahoma City. He watched as the firemen carried the limp and bloody bodies of toddlers from the ruins…. He says that in the past he was able to distance himself from other people’s suffering. But since he’s become a father…he feels as if each of those children were his child…
This kinship with the suffering of others, this inability to continue to regard it from afar, is…the discovery of [our] noble and awakened heart.”
I have come to believe in the necessity of looking out at the world and seeing all people as our own children. While we cannot alone ease every suffering, we can at least begin to create a place within ourselves where we can bring those sorrows, draw comfort, and offer our deepest hopes for the suffering family of this world.
I imagine the garden in the title of this piece as a place we enter prayerfully, seeking healing. Every path returns to the same upwelling of sorrow. This is the well of compassion that springs from our awakened heart—a pool where we bathe in our common wishes for kindness and for peace. The final moments of the piece envision a place where all of the broken and lost ones might be found and made whole, their child-souls playing and sleeping in the safety of encompassing love.
The piece draws on the semi-improvisational instrumental form from Albania called kaba, or “music with tears.” Although it is not specifically about Albania, I was inspired by the great sadness and the sighing pull of the lines in kaba; it seemed an especially good carrier for the content of the piece, composed as it was during yet another war. Longing for peace in the garden of lost children was written for eighth blackbird, and was commissioned by the Third Practice Festival in 2005.
Technical notes:
This piece can be performed in three configurations:
1. instruments only without amplification, tape, or live processing
2. (This is the most often performed version) instruments and audio cues with a series of discreet triggered audio cues (without amplification or live processing)–requires audio operator and computer playback, but makes coordination easier
3. instruments and tape with amplification and live processing
Option 1: instruments only–requires no explanation
Option 2: instruments and audio cues–A compact disk containing 8 separate stereo audio cues is available from music@evanchambers.net . These can be loaded onto a computer, and triggered to play at the appropriate times in any audio program such as MAX/MSP, Digital Performer, etc. This version requires a separate audio operator, mixing board, and amplifier/speakers.
Option 3: instruments and tape with amplification and live processing– data cd containing 8 separate stereo audio cues and MAX/MSP patches is available from music@evanchambers.net . MAX patches are used to trigger audio at the appropriate times and process live sound as described in the readme file on the disk.
Email for details on option 3.
Evan Chambers 2005
Duration: 9'
Program note:
In her book When Things Fall Apart, Pema Chödrön writes: “The father of a two-year-old talks about turning on the television and unexpectedly seeing the bombing…in Oklahoma City. He watched as the firemen carried the limp and bloody bodies of toddlers from the ruins…. He says that in the past he was able to distance himself from other people’s suffering. But since he’s become a father…he feels as if each of those children were his child…
This kinship with the suffering of others, this inability to continue to regard it from afar, is…the discovery of [our] noble and awakened heart.”
I have come to believe in the necessity of looking out at the world and seeing all people as our own children. While we cannot alone ease every suffering, we can at least begin to create a place within ourselves where we can bring those sorrows, draw comfort, and offer our deepest hopes for the suffering family of this world.
I imagine the garden in the title of this piece as a place we enter prayerfully, seeking healing. Every path returns to the same upwelling of sorrow. This is the well of compassion that springs from our awakened heart—a pool where we bathe in our common wishes for kindness and for peace. The final moments of the piece envision a place where all of the broken and lost ones might be found and made whole, their child-souls playing and sleeping in the safety of encompassing love.
The piece draws on the semi-improvisational instrumental form from Albania called kaba, or “music with tears.” Although it is not specifically about Albania, I was inspired by the great sadness and the sighing pull of the lines in kaba; it seemed an especially good carrier for the content of the piece, composed as it was during yet another war. Longing for peace in the garden of lost children was written for eighth blackbird, and was commissioned by the Third Practice Festival in 2005.
Technical notes:
This piece can be performed in three configurations:
1. instruments only without amplification, tape, or live processing
2. (This is the most often performed version) instruments and audio cues with a series of discreet triggered audio cues (without amplification or live processing)–requires audio operator and computer playback, but makes coordination easier
3. instruments and tape with amplification and live processing
Option 1: instruments only–requires no explanation
Option 2: instruments and audio cues–A compact disk containing 8 separate stereo audio cues is available from music@evanchambers.net . These can be loaded onto a computer, and triggered to play at the appropriate times in any audio program such as MAX/MSP, Digital Performer, etc. This version requires a separate audio operator, mixing board, and amplifier/speakers.
Option 3: instruments and tape with amplification and live processing– data cd containing 8 separate stereo audio cues and MAX/MSP patches is available from music@evanchambers.net . MAX patches are used to trigger audio at the appropriate times and process live sound as described in the readme file on the disk.
Email for details on option 3.