forces: flt, cl (bass), hn, tpt, pf, vln, vc.
A House of Rumours takes it’s title from a poem by the Scottish poet Robin Robertson and refers to book XII of Ovid’s Metamorphoses.“In the centre of the world there’s a place and to it’s listening ears comes every sound. A shadowy throng and a thousand rumours, false mixed with true, stray this way and that, whole confused words flit about. Some of them pour their stories into idle ears, others carry off elsewhere the tales they have been told, the story grows, and each new tellers adds something to what he has heard.” The pieces consists of seven movements that run into one another.
I. a room of shadows
II. echoing chambers
III. the room of memory
IV. where walls have ears
V. a whispering gallery
VI. another room of shadows
VII. the shuttered chamber
A House of Rumours was commissioned by the Riot Ensemble who gave the first performance, conducted by Aaron Holloway Nahum, at Kings Place, London, 15 January 2021.
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