Animal within Animal
for trombone solo and electronics
9 minutes
Commissioned by the American Composers Orchestra
Animal within Animal explores the intersection of dreams, memory, and the unheimlich using the ancient practice of incubation as a point of departure.
The ritual of incubation focuses upon sleeping within a sacred space to inspire, heal, or find catharsis through a divinely inspired dream. I found this image of one returning to an ancestral place to commune with the supernatural both beautiful and transcendental.
The title is a reference to a medical text by the ancient Greek medic Aretaeus concerning the wandering womb — a now obviously discredited theory that the womb is able to float around within the body as if an animal within another animal. Bizarre and alluring, I found this much like the struggle for understanding within a dream. A struggle actualized by the trombone, forever stuck within a musical event horizon hoping to escape the gravitational pull of a single pitch.
SCORING:
Trombone Solo and Electronics (Stereo Playback with discreet click track)
