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BREATHTAILS
a song cycle in 21 breaths
Commissioned by Mutable Music
music: Anne LeBaron
poems: Charles Bernstein
Ian Walker, baritone
Ralph Samuelson, shakuhachi
The Formalist Quartet
Performed at REDCAT in Los Angeles
Apr. 11, 2014

Breathtails was developed through an intensely collaborative process with the poet Charles Bernstein. The ethereal, breath-infused sounds of the shakuhachi served as the initial inspiration for the central subject of Breathtails, namely, the breath. Commissioned by Mutable Music for Thomas Buckner, it is scored for baritone, shakuhachi, and string quartet. The libretto, divided into twenty-one sections, has thirteen distinct poems and seven text-less Breath Interludes. The singer improvises the interludes at pre-established locations in the score, guided by a variety of textured white papers labeled with the senses of sight, touch, and smell.