a stone the size of a dream

for soprano, flute and cello

a stone the size of a dream (2014)

video from premiere performance at soundSCAPE festival;

Maccagno, Italy, July 2014

Tony Arnold, soprano

Chelsea Czuchra, flute

Stephen Marotto, cello

Stones and dreams, longings, impossibilities. These are at the heart of the songs of exile, written by Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish.

This specific poem, Psalm Nine, is part of a cycle borrowing its name from those other exile songs found in the Jewish Bible. Between distance and closeness, between Babylon and Zion, Israelis and Palestinians, we remain strangers; then and now, there and here.

Or do we?