...as dreams are made on (2020)

‘…as dreams are made on’ is a Rodenkirchener Kammerorchester (Cologne) and Presteigne Festival co-commission and was completed in December 2019. Premieres were inevitably postponed.

The title quotes from Prospero’s ‘Our revels now are ended’ speech (The Tempest - Act 4, scene 1) which is a meditation on the ephemeral nature of existence as well as Prospero’s abjuring his magical powers and – possibly - Shakespeare signing out as an author. The relevant line is:

We are such stuff
As dreams are made on, and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep. 

which is the starting point of this piece and which sets in train a gently rocking, almost lullaby-like motion succeeded by a series of descending and ascending answering motifs. The descending ideas prevail and a gradual unease begins to pervade the piece; a violent chord gives way to a disjunct violin solo which in turn leads back to the opening bars – rounding ‘…as dreams are made on’ with a sleep.

Written after the death of the former but before that of the latter, I now regard this piece as a memorial to Oliver Knussen and Simon Bainbridge, two close friends who left us far too early.

Gary Carpenter – July 2021