Bourland chamber music: Nostos (1982)

NOSTOS (1982) mp3
for flute, alto flute, soprano and alto saxophones, clarinet and bass clarinet

Music: Roger Bourland
Ensemble: Composers in Red Sneakers, Concert 7
Conductor: Theodore Antoniou
Yelton Rhodes Music

MP3: Play audio file (Nostos.mp3)

In my composer-biography phase of movie watching lately I watched biographies of Rachmaninov and Tchaikovsky. Both tremendously popular composers, but both lived with nostos their entire lives. Nostos in their cases meant a deep inner yearning for their homeland, Russia. Their music likely was a tremendous outlet for this homesickness.

I remember working for Hadjidakis all alone in Athens for a month, cut off from English speaking friends and my culture, I had a tremendous sense of nostos for home, which was Boston at that time. So, in the time that I wasn’t walking around Athens or working for Manos, I composed “Nostos.”