three declarations of love and a dead bunny (2023)
Written: August — October 2023
Duration: ca. 7’
Instrumentation: soprano + fl/bfl + bcl + perc + vln (TAK Ensemble)
Performance History
October 27, 2023: TAK Ensemble, Charlotte Mundy [soprano], Laura Cocks [fl/bfl], Madison Greenstone [bcl], Ellery Trafford [perc], Marina Kifferstein [vln] — Ramo Recital Hall, Los Angeles, CA — (World Premiere)
recording available upon request
Text
by Ella Kaale
this summer is the apocalypse.
last night i walked outside and there was a dead bunny at my feet.
this summer is the apocalypse.
i read an article about the significance of dead bunnies.
good news, the bunny is supposed to suck in all my negative feelings like a sponge!— dead bunny omen?
omens are usually self-fulfilling prophecies? this dead bunny is exactly what i make of it? if my thoughts went something like this:
i hope this doesn’t have anything to do with...
it is precisely that thing it has everything and nothing else to do with.
this summer is the apocalypse.
(i’m not a siren i’m just a dove)
Program Notes
three declarations of love and a dead bunny is about the constant search for meaning in the universe, accidentally finding it, but it isn’t the meaning you wanted, so you accept that you are perpetually the melodramatic ingénue in a Rococo painting, the kind of painting someone stands in front of for a good 15 seconds, says “wow...”, and moves on.
The title is loosely inspired by Fragonard’s The Progression of Love, a very silly set of panels displaying the wonders of heterosexual courtship and nuclear happily-ever-after. Much of the textures in this piece as well as the diction and tone are inspired by Kate Soper’s Only the Words Themselves Mean What They Say (my karaoke song). The second half is heavily inspired by Weyes Blood’s “Movies”, a song that answers the questions raised by the prophetic memory in the first half.
three declarations of love and a dead bunny was written for the incomparable TAK Ensemble as part of their residency at USC Thornton in Fall 2023. I am so grateful for this opportunity, the support and love this community gives me is so special and important to me, always a glowing heart amid the epic highs and lows of late-stage girlhood.