After Beauty (2013)

Written for Rhymes with Opera’s inaugural New Chamber Music Workshop
Premiered on August 10, 2013 at the National Opera Center in Manhattan, NY.

(2 sopranos, mezzo-soprano, cello)

I like beauty. The rare, ephemeral moments that propel us through the otherwise mundane. The words of Stephen Dunn, the artwork of Matisse, the music of James Taylor, the long running joke with an old friend, a smile from a loved one. Adapting lines from St. Augustine and Sara Teasdale, After Beauty is a meditation on beauty remembered and beauty sought after and is my attempt to try to capture one of those rare moments.

Love is the beauty of the soul.
I have remembered beauty in the night
I have remembered music in the dark
I have remembered beauty in her eyes
I have remembered music in her heart

Lover of beauty, my thoughts seek you
like the waves seek the shore.

Text adapted from St. Augustine and Sara Teasdale’s poem, To E.