Australian Music Centre | Breaking sound barriers

Work Overview

When faced with the task of writing something that reflects the vastness and diversity of the Riverina area of New South Wales, Kara looked to wider inspiration for one of the three Riverina Water community grants awarded to the Assai Quartet in 2022 to commission and record new Australian music composed and performed by local musicians about the area in which they lived.

This through-composed programmatic work in five sections portrays fundamental environmental elements in the Riverina - one of the planet's largest alluvial plains. Acknowledging and respecting the traditional owners of the land on which this work is inspired, the Riverina sits within Wiradjuri Nation, the largest indigenous areas in New South Wales. Known as the "people of three rivers", the Wiradjuri people have deep connections with the Murrumbidgee River, the Lachlan River and the Macquarie River. More widely, the Riverina is also a significant contemporary agricultural area that is reliant and focused on water.

The crystalline beauty of hard frost that glints and dissolves as the sun steals across the earth, beckoning the avian chorus and conjuring tendrils of steamy mist that vanish into the day. Increasingly burdensome, the first droplets, then torrents fall: dancing in the wind and permeating the soil, forging gulleys, tributaries, and vast waterways that cleanse, nourish, and sustain the great alluvial plain - omnipresent and unwearyingly preparing for its next song…

Orchestrated for wind ensemble by Kara soon after the Assai Quartet recording 'Origin' featuring this work was released in 2022, the original quartet setting has also now been updated to include a piano part as substitute for guitar and amendment/addition of musical material emerging from the wind ensemble orchestration process.

Work Details

Year: 2022

Instrumentation: Flute, bassoon (or cello), violin, guitar (or piano), 

Duration: 8 min.

Difficulty: Advanced

Contents note: I. Frost -- II. Sun -- III. Rain -- IV. Waterways -- V. Earth.

Commission note: Commissioned by Assai Quartet.