I. Dream Nr. 1
II. Dream Nr. 2 (5:43)
Written for string quartet, custom music box, and electronically-controlled sound sculptures, “Sophia’s Wide Awake Dreams” (2017) was adapted from Lembit Beecher’s opera “Sophia’s Forest.” These two movements suggest the inner imaginative world of the protagonist, a 9-year old recent immigrant to the United States named Sophia. In the opera, Sophia confides in a music box that gradually comes alive in her mind, a mechanical creature both comforting and dangerous, who shields her from the outside world.
The sound sculptures used in the recording were built in collaboration with the ExCITe Center at Drexel University. The music box is a vintage Thorens music box modified by Jonathan Herz of the Herz Music Box Company to play a melody Lembit composed.
Recorded and produced by Ryan Streber at Oktaven Audio. Video by Four/Ten Media. From the Aizuri Quartet’s GRAMMY-nominated debut album Blueprinting (New Amsterdam Records, 2018).,
