Programme Notes

Much of my music is in some way, on some level, inspired by light. But there can be no light without a dark side, and dark matters. This work for large chamber ensemble plays with register and colour, exploring the darkness of brighter instruments and finding brightness in the darker instruments. The alto flute and bass clarinet, traditionally used for their lower registers but here exploited for their full ranges, are especially highlighted.

Dark Matters also draws inspiration from the unseen connecting "dark matter" of the universe, which for me parallels the invisible and intuitive connection between an ensemble's members, who together can make virtuosity sound easy. Appropriately, these seven evanescent movements, balanced and reflected around a central meditation, are connected into the larger whole by measured silence.

On another level, the three kinds of "dark matter" -- Hot, Warm and Cold -- bring to mind the "Hot and Cold" hunting game we played as children, and so these Dark Matters also possess, I hope, some of the childlike spontaneity and freedom which delight in the richness of the present moment.

Dark Matters was commissioned by Aventa (Bill Linwood, Artistic Director) with assistance from the Canada Council for the Arts.