Program Notes

Continuum Music (Toronto) commission with the Canada Council.

A work interweaving text from Ovid's Metamorphoses that deals with the sun.

Regia Solis erat sublimibus alta columni, clara micante auro flammasque imitante pyropo [Book II]

Sous le ciel de l'Hesperie, il y a des paturages des chevaux du soleil; au lieu du gazon, on y trouve de l'ambroisie. Tandis que ces coursiers se repaissent la de cette celeste nourriture et que la nuit prend son tour, la Dieu entre dans la chambre de sa bien aimee. Il lui donne alors des baisers, telle une mere a sa fille cherie. Lui dit "Je suis celui qui mesure la longueur del'annee; celui qui voit tout et par qui la terre voit tout. Je suis l'oeil du monde, et, cros-moi, je t'aime." [Book IV How the Sun fell in love ]

There is nothing in the whole world that is constant: Everything is in a state of flux and comes into being as an ephemeral image. Even time itself flows on in constant motion, just like a river. For neither the river nor the fleeting hour can stand still. But as wave is chased by wave and, itself pursued, pursues the one before, so time flees and follows and is ever new. That which was before is left behind and that which did not exist has come to be. And so every moment is ever renewed. you see how nights rush into daylight and how the shining rays succeed the darkness of the night. The colour in the sky is not the same when all things lie wearily in the midnight, and bright Lucifer comes out on his white steed. And it changes again when Pallantias, forerunner of daylight, dyes the sky she will surrender to Phoebus - the orb of the sun-god himself, red in the morning when he rises from the depths of the earth, white at his zenith, and red when he plunges again beneath the earth. [Book XV The Teachings of Pythagoras]

texts from Ovid's Metamorphoses English and French translations by Jimia Boutouba (1998) used with permission of the translator.