The Brimming Stone

The poem by the composer which inspired this music: Moving backwards/Through the future/ On my way past now/ To arrive/ For the first time/ This is a Zen map/ The original place/ Your original face/ Edges slide down/ To prayer/ I am here/ Not, nowhere/ I have every human right to live/ Out of the brimming stone of fissure/ Blinking/ Breathing/ New/ Now..Further on in the composition process, when back in London, a second set of words was felt to be needed to help open a context for the first poem. These started as the phrase la di da maybe at first, I was considering melodic material, without words readily available, so I used la di da, but it struck me there was something about the syllables. Nothing I could analyse, but a feeling they had a reason for being there. La di da became an integral element of the piece. (Hopefully not chastised down to blah di blah!) More words were inviting themselves in, to explore another layer of the narrative, and these are more like a meditation - on the meaning of ocean and the waves as a metaphor for life....Waves upon the ocean roll/ Upon the ocean, deep/ Wave upon wave, rolling along/ Strong current below/ Go slow/ Dive down seabed silent/ Sink down steep drop/ Deep peace breathe/ Surface waves roll,/ To and fro come and go/ Waves are part of surface flow/ Seabed quiet and low/ Current's tow/ Still below/ Silent silence silent silence/ Many waves/ One sea/ Tumbling in waves/ High tide low tide,/ Still sea below/ Waves upon the ocean roll/ Waves are only surface flow. Four Songs - As One: as the composition developed the poem, and the music, called for more 'context.' What started off as a simple song-setting of words of the original poem, turned into what could be described as four songs, as one'. The two sets of words quoted above, the la di da, and then the fourth element to appear was the gong, and with it a need to open more space in the piece. The original poem seemed to be full of emotional waves' and there was a call for more and more unfathomable ocean' in the music which the gong helped conjure. As I have been receiving sound baths' in the last few years, which incorporate long spells of soundings with gongs, it felt necessary to invite in these much longer spans of sound-time-space-windows'. The gong took on that role. The Four Songs As One in the order they appear in the music are - 1. The Listening Gong 2. La Di Da, a Divine Joke 3. Waves Above: Still Below 4. The Brimming Stone. The audio demo is currently available as a Sibelius software rendition using Note Performer. The vocals are simulated using an ah-ish sound throughout. THIS PIECE WAS COMMENDED TO THE BBC SINGERS IN FEBRUARY 2024 by composer Dame Judith Weir and conductor Alexander Ingram. They have graciously acknowledged receipt of the score.