Description

The third of my initial forays into this style and ensemble, this portrays a hot, shimmering day, probably in a desert, where you can see the heatwaves hovering over the sand.  The double bass is an unlikely soloist, accompanied by tinkling, drifting piano, up to its highest note this time.  The piece grasps reality for a while in the middle, in a sturdier section, though the heatwaves still float and throb, then the hot landscape returns, but dreamlike, like a mirage.  The piece ends in one of my favourite ways: it just stops. The image here isn’t of the shimmering desert that I’ve described, but was a blistering hot day at an ancient city in central Georgia, where the only respite from the baking sun was wine ice-cream. On the top of the ridge is the old Silk Road.