Isles of Dune 1

Isles of Dune 2

About Isle of Dunes

One of the activities I enjoy the most is traveling to this country's National Parks. In the 23 years that I've lived here, I have been to at least fifteen of them, and those in the great Southwest desert provide me with the greatest inspiration. In that landscape, which has extraordinary power over the human imagination and spirit, I see patterns and relationships. The desert has taught me about light, color, form, texture, and movement. I see its rhythms, its rise and fall, its tension and release, that are very much related to our own. Throughout this dance are movements that I created from images of the American desert-the endless horizon, the cactus, the rolling sand dunes, the gigantic rocks, the animals and the myths of the Native Americans who embraced this land. From time to time, subconsciously, images of the vast desert in Asia also came to my mind and inspired me. -Nai-Ni Chen

Composer's note on Isle of Dunes/Desert Myths

Having spent eighteen years living in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and traveling extensively around the American Southwest, I have a vivid connection to the landscape, the brown hills, the red rocks, the caves carved into the sides of mountains where animals and people took refuge, the sweet smell of precious rain as it moves across the desert, the storms that can be seen from miles away, just beyond the next ridge or mesa, the stark stone sculptures, monuments carved by winds, rain, and retreating ancient seas. In my music I have tried to reflect the undulating desert floor, sudden slashes of lightning, the hot-white sunlight that bakes the earth, the golden glow of late afternoon light, dust devils and tumbleweeds blown by dry winds, cracked riverbeds waiting for the rushing torrents of flash floods, striations of beige, grey, and pink colors in hills of rock and broken stones, roiling clouds in the endless sky, the shock of desert flowers, brilliant yellow, red, blue, purple, violet, and the strange creatures that wriggle swiftly in the desert dust. Some of the music is intentionally "atmospheric." Certain elements are occasionally heard as if from a great distance, like the wooden flute sounding almost as if coming from a distant mountain, or perhaps in memory. The pianist often plays inside the piano, directly on the strings, with open palms or felt mallets, to give the feeling of distant thunder. I have also drawn inspiration from some of the marvelous myths and stories that abound in the southwestern culture, especially those that involve trickster Coyote and the whispering ghosts. Nai-Ni's focus on the elements of earth, fire, water, and wind have also influenced the shape and flow of my music, Desert Myths, for Isle of Dunes. Ne(x)tworks are brilliant musicians, fearless and willing interpreters devoted to realizing complex and sometimes unusual ideas, and I am grateful for their consummate skill and intelligence. -Joan La Barbara