Stabat Mater (2021)

My intention in composing this piece was in a sense to write a Stabat Mater about the Stabat Mater - what it has, and has not, been over its 600-year musical history. In my reading, what it has largely not been is a humanistic representation of the agony of a mother watching her child brutally killed; neither has it really represented her natural attempts to comfort him, despite her own suffering. I also expand the view, and treat the Stabat Mater as an example of the beautification of suffering more broadly. A challenge for me while writing the piece was to balance my wish to participate in the tradition of beautiful, melancholic music in Stabat Mater settings - which is what initially drew me to the project - while also looking at what that obscures.

- Tyler Futrell