yours in the process of being absorbed [2023]

baritone & ensemble [40’]

[voice; b.clarinet; piano; violin; cello; bass; percussion]

Commissioned by the Schallfeld Ensemble with the support of the Ernst von Siemens Music Foundation.

performance history

3/20/2025 - Ty Bouque & Schallfeld Ensemble. IGNM Basel. Basel, Switzerland.

12/2/2024 - Alinéa Ensemble. Conrad Prebys Music Center. UCSD. San Diego.

9/11/2023 - Ty Bouque & Schallfeld Ensemble. Klangspuren Schwaz. Innsbruck, Austria.

program note

Slowly, softly, noisily,

seeking within itself.

Sinking into itself,

search of deeper hollows,

voids, clearings, openings.

Always pushing for a space beyond a space.

Always sinking inwards, underneath, within.

Subterranean spaces.

Sub-spaces.

The labor of surrender.

Obliteration, sublimation, absorption.

From one to the other.

To live through the experience is to live beyond it.

Search for a place from which you cannot go back,

because:

how could you?

text

song i

burrower, in folds,

in slick veins,

make a home,

take me there.

song ii

split possession

absorbing ghosts

ripple back, arched,

in the exact shape of my veins

passage ii

hungry worm within a hungry ghost

song iii

you were there, too,

in the room,

Stowaway,

loving them as i did.

love me, too.

love me. love my blood.