Abstraction of the End (2019)

Abstraction of the End (2019), for flute, viola, percussion, and piano, was composed in collaboration with choreographer Lydia Heidt during the Charlotte New Music Dance Co-Lab Program. The work has no specific program, but rather is a meditation on the meaning of life that formally constructed along life’s journey.

Humanity is metaphorically built from melodic and motivic ideas that gradually form into a more complete melodic idea. Once that happens the idea morphs and evolves and expands over a steady, if slightly off kilter, accompaniment in the piano, which can be likened to the river of life. Finally, movement collapses, and the ideas refragment themselves into distant memories, similar to the end of life. The work contrasts pain and beauty, while giving more credence to neither, as both are integral parts of the human experience.