I see music as an exploration of the essence of communication in its raw, extralinguistic forms—in call-and-response, mimicry, disagreement, deceit, apathy, and all of the ways that we orient ourselves in relation to others. I am thus fascinated by the innate theater of performing music—how the physical acts of playing instruments manifest characters on stage, imbued with a sense of personality, desire, and intent. These musical characters become simultaneously individual and archetypical, like characters in a 15th century morality play. The project of this piece was to compose with this quality of performance in mind, conceiving of musical characters not only as emotionally reactive beings, but as moralized ones—as representing good or evil.

The unique sound world and the unique world of physical gesture that airborne extended embodies presents a robust playground for this exploration, and it has been an absolute joy working with them.