Place of Composition / Studio Center for Computer Music (Brooklyn College) and Electronic Music Studio A - Stony Brook University
Instrumentation
Musical Category Electroacoustic Music ("tape music")
Instrumentation (general) Electroacoustics4-channel acousmatic music
Premiere
Date 1988
Venue Stony Brook University
Town New York
Country United States of America
Program Notes
This work belongs to a group of seven works that is not finished yet. This group of works was originally thought to evoke musically the book of Revelation in the New Testament. However its context was somewhat enlarged and turned into a meditation on the meaning of the word "Revelation" itself. The Eternal City uses as text excerpts of the twenty-first and twenty-second chapters of the book of Revelation, in the New Testament, in the latin version.
Text:
Et vidi caelum novum et terram novam. Primum enim caelum, et prima terra abiit, et mare iam non est.
Et vidi sanctam civitatem Ierusalem novam descendentem de caelo a Deo: et lumen eius simile lapidi pretioso tanquam lapidi iaspidis, sicut crystallum. et longitudo, et altitudo, et latitudo eius aequalia sunt, ipsa vero civitas aurum mundum simile vitro mundo.
Et templum non vidi in ea: Dominus enim Deus omnipotens templum illius est, et Agnus.
Et civitas non eget sole, neque luna ut luceant in ea, nam claritas Dei illuminavit eam.
In medio plateae eius lignum vitae, afferens fructus duodecim, et folia ligni ad sanitatem gentium.
Sedes Dei et Agni in illa erunt, et regnabunt in saecula saeculorum.
Translation of the text:
I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea.
I saw the Holy City, the New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, and its brilliance was like that of a precious jewel, like a jasper, clear as crystal.
The city was laid out as a square, as long as it was wide, and it was made of pure gold, as pure as glass.
I did not see a temple in the city, because the Lord God and the Lamb are its temple.
The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light.
There stood the tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, and the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.
The throne of God will be in the Eternal City.
This work was first composed at the Center for Computer Music at Brooklyn College, and at the Electronic Music Studio A of Stony Brook University. This version was revised at the Electronic Music Studio of the University of Aveiro, and at the composer's private studio.
Commission
Date 1995
Commissioning Body Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation - Music Service
