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The dark has its own light A video score for improvising ensemble Written for and premiered by The BSC December 6, 2005 Download the score "The dark has its own light. A son has many fathers. Stand by a slow stream: Hear the sigh of what is. Be a pleased rock On a plain day. Waking's Kissing. Yes." -- Theodore Roethke, "O Thou Opening, O" in The Waking "Wabi sabi embodies the Zen nihilistic cosmic view and seeks beauty in the imperfections found as all things, in a constant state of flux, evolve from nothing and devolve back to nothing." -- Andrew Juniper, Wabi Sabi: The Japanese Art of Impermanence I have always been interested in the ways that sound and image can come together. In "The dark has its own light," inspired by the Theodore Roethke poem above, I've created a video score for the BSC to interpret. Images take the place of notes; suggestions take the place of notation. Rather than force the musicians to follow a fast-moving visual stream, I chose to create a slowly evolving process by slowly dissolving between several of my own photographs. I like the idea of conjuring slowly evolving musical worlds and the way this idea might parallel the natural processes implicit in many of the photographs: the changes that sun, wind, rain and most of all time bring to things. I must also mention Fred Frith's wonderful collection of photographic scores, Stone Brick Glass Wood Wire, which was a great inspiration to me.