Voices: SATB - Who What When Where Why (and a few other questions)

The text for this piece is comprised entirely of questions, submitted to me by friends and acquaintances, in response to the prompt: “What are five questions you ask yourself on a given day?" I received about 150 questions from 30 sources, ranging from the profound to the very mundane.

The next task was to arrange them into a libretto. I was struck by the searching, almost spiritual quality of so many questions—little snapshots of peoples’ lives—all jumbled together. I sorted them into five categories: who, what, when, where, and why. I liked how this five-part organization echoed the familiar structure of an ordinary Catholic Mass, with its Kyrie, Gloria, Credo, Sanctus, and Agnus Dei.

As I was writing, I was reminded of a quote from James Baldwin: “You must understand that your pain is trivial except insofar as you can use it to connect with other people’s pain.” As I arranged and set the anxieties and curiosities of my friends and family, I felt like I was allowed access to something sacred and personal.

My hope in writing this piece is to celebrate and combine these little moments in order to find something shared and universal.

Perusal score: view here