Goli az dast beraft (2017) (گلی از دست برفت) – for SATB choir a cappella (6′)
-Commissioned by the VocalEssence Ensemble Singers (Phillip Brunelle, cond.) as part of the VocalEssence ReMix Program which is funded by the Jerome Foundation.
——————————————-
This short and somber Persian lullaby, in the form of a rubaiyat, tells of the loss of a lover and what remains in the shadow of this loss. The text is presented in three iterations, bookended by ethereal, gentle humming. The first presentation acts as a hushed and fragile recount of the speaker’s loss, the sighing nature of the leaps in the melodic structure emphasized by the limping, hollow unisons. The second presentation offers a partial harmonization of various stressed and unstressed syllables and words with a slightly stronger, more intense dynamic. The final presentation is a full harmonization and elegiac declaration which descends into a muted and muddled finish, wandering, humming, soothing.