instrumentation: tenor, piano

year composed: 2024 | 15 minutes

I selected poems from Shangyang Fang's book Burying the Mountain to compose this song cycle which centers around the reconciliation of grief and one's personal identity. Grief and its source are challenging, but knowing what is to come next is most challenging, in my opinion. Once I have dealt with this pain, what am I supposed to feel? What and who must I leave behind, and what and who must I bring with me into the future? Fang's poetry doesn't answer these questions, and neither does my music, but these songs are reflections on these questions / ideas.