Songs of Immortal Sleep - for mezzo-soprano, flute/bass flute and 'cello: Trio Atem

This sets two texts by Edgar Allan Poe in each of the two respective movements. The proportions are unusual: the first being five-minutes in duration, the second being 20 minutes. The work as a whole articulates a single-dramatic arc through a number of compositional devices: saving the simultaneous use of all three instruments until the end of movement two; a gradual move from pizzicato to arco cello and from bass flute to flute; move outwards towards registral extremes; accelerating tempo structure. The second movement employs an innovative isorhythmic structure, whereby the talea includes an internal metric modulation such that it accelerates on each pass.