12 minutes
2005

Here is a piece that, as much as anything, simply revels in the glorious sonorities and colors available with such a combination of instruments. Sparkling and resonant, shifting and kaleidoscopic. There are some large-scale tectonic forces at work here, especially in terms of the directionality of the various overlapping gestures offered up by the three harmonic instruments. The alto flute, impractically underused, makes just three brief, discrete, appearances—always the same, but always different. Restraint is a quality that is quite underrepresented in most music. Here the most important thing—the indispensable element—is that which is used most sparingly.