Honey

Program Notes

Commissioned by SoHap Ensemble (Sabina Balsamo and Chas Barnard,) Honey takes on ideas of hope and hopelessness, a balance between the two, and the people around us who make the former possible. I am a massive fan of Jane Hirshfield and her poetry—her texts, calm at the surface but rippling with meaning for miles below, always allow rich windows for interpretation, and this cycle was no different. In The Promise, a narrative voice calls out for support from everything around her, finding solace only in her “loves”—in Bees, we dissect an almost trolley-problem-like decision, the balance between bliss and horror, and discuss the lure of uncritical, blank optimism in the face of this eternally-lingering question.