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Program Notes:

Gleams from the Bosom of Darkness, for symphonic band and chorus, is influenced by various sources of light: the moon, stars, lanterns, and lighthouses that guide our way through darkness. Light exhibits different intensities, colors, and halos. It flickers, twinkles, shimmers, dazzles, gleams, and dims. All of these visual images found their way into my score. Therefore, Gleams from the Bosom of Darkness is a journey through darkness surrounded by ever-changing sources of light. Symbolically, light helps us move from darkness to a better place in our lives, from difficult times to better ones.
 

The endless coloristic opportunities that the chorus and wind ensemble provide drove me to create an atmospheric, mysterious, and somewhat meditative work rather than a piece that uses the wind ensemble merely as an accompanist to the chorus. Blocks of sound and rapidly changing colors replace lyrical melodies or functional harmonies. The chorus and wind ensemble function as a single body; both are instruments as well as voices.
 

My search for texts ended when I read the poems and other writings of Henry W. Longfellow (1807-1882). Longfellow’s work is replete with descriptive images of light and darkness, both visually and symbolically. His poems offer the closest written descriptions of light and darkness as I imagined while composing the music. Written at a time when electricity was just being introduced, his poems still convey a romantic quality in their depiction of light—a more personal connection between humanity and illumination. In my composition, I used fragments from various poems to support the musical exploration of light and darkness.
 

Gleams from the Bosom of Darkness was commissioned by “The Frank L. Battisti 70th Birthday Commission Project” and is dedicated to Frank Battisti in fond appreciation of his life achievements.

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