Northern Lights
for clarinet and cello (2020)
duration: 10’
GRT • 226
score available from
Australian Music Centre
program note
1. luminous, radiant
2. serene, ethereal, timeless
3. drifting away
This duo is written for my good friends Paul and Trish Dean. Northern lights provide one of Earth’s beautiful ‘unearthly’ spectacles. A trick of science and nature, charged particles from the sun are trapped in our planet’s magnetic field, creating a beautiful spectrum of coloured light in dark skies. Most famously seen in the northern polar regions (such as Alaska, Iceland and Norway), the lights can also be seen in the far south in Tasmania and New Zealand. These three movements progress from illuminated radiant swirls to a serene ethereal timeless state, finally drifting away into the dark night.