Christopher Cerrone Beaufort Scales Lorelei Ensemble - CB0068 - Contemporain

Beaufort Scales is a shimmering, mesmerizing work for women’s voices and electronics, performed by the Lorelei Ensemble. Its text is drawn from the Beaufort Wind Force Scale (a measure of wind speed created by Francis Beaufort in 1805), as well as writings by Herman Melville, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Anne Carson. Cerrone writes about the piece: “I first became aware of the Beaufort scale because of Scott Huler’s book Defining the Wind, which describes the elegance and beauty of this 13-step, 200-word scale, still in use, which measures wind from its gentlest (“Calm / smoke rises vertically”) to its roughest (“The air is filled with foam and spray”). . . . I began composing a work for eight female voices and electronics, transforming the steps of the scale into 13 corresponding movements of escalating musical intensity. As the work proceeds and the weather becomes more chaotic, each of the voices is increasingly distorted. This mirrors our technology-saturated world, one in which uncanny and tumultuous weather has a growing presence. Interpolated between these 13 sung movements are four narrated interludes featuring texts from Herman Melville and F. Scott Fitzgerald, Anne Carson, and the King James Bible—all of which comment on the state of weather, serving as both a reprieve and a reflection upon the surrounding movements.” [CD in 6-panel wallet, with booklet]