Where Leaves and Birds a Music Spin

For Flute/Piccolo, Tuba and Piano

From the composer:

“Where Leaves And Birds A Music Spin” consists of six short movements, each loosely depicting a scene in nature.

1. Borne On a Great Wind
2. And the River Flows Ever Onwards
3. Emerson’s Acorn
4. Through Dawn Mist, A Doe
5. Dauwtrappen
6. Lithic Engines

The first scene is a fantasy of being carried on the wind, rushing over the landscape below. The second follows the journey of a river, through winding meandering paths to rapids. The third movement is based on a quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson’s essay on History that reads, “The creation of a thousand forests is in one acorn.” In the fourth, a scene unfolds of a foggy morning and the appearance of a doe. The word Dauwtrappen comes from Dutch and describes the concept of walking barefoot in the morning grass when the grass is still covered in dew. The final movement imagines the inner workings of the planet, with lithic, or rock and magma, engines driving continents, creating new lands, mountain ranges, as well as the slow destruction and recycling of the old.

Although I have suggested scenes with each title, I don’t intend these to be concrete depictions, and the listener should let their minds wander freely and create their own scenes as the piece progresses.