One Voice (2016), world premiere by Mara Gibson

Breath

I left the biggest space for it.

Have a hard time
thinking of it. Oh it’s supposed to be
so DEEP, go all the way down. Breathe into your pelvis,
into your feet. There comes a point

when you see that none of it is bullshit after all & at that point
no one wants to read your poems anymore. I probably peaked

at twenty-two. The universe is a breath
& every breath a universe. Oh god I’ve done it again:

took too big a breath, bigger than “natural.” Told my friend
I wasn’t sighing at her. I’m no longer a teenager. She’s good; she gets it.

The thing that got me hooked at first on breath
is how much warmer it is coming out than going in.

Come in, air around me! Is what I say in my mind, Come in and I’ll do something to you & you’ll be the same again soon.
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By Hannah Ensor
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Composed for Megan Ihnen and Michael Hall, "One Voice" is intended to be exactly that. Each performer is charged with mimicking the phonetic sounds between one another: some are spoken, some sung and many played. The aim is to blend as much as possible with one another. The voice and the viola are closer than one might initially think. A big part of this idea came from the Asian ehru, an instrument inspired by the sound of wind. Humanly voiced, like the viola, mezzo is the natural compliment.