Theologoumenon

Instrumentation

picc-33-3-bcl-3-cbsn;4-3-3-1; perc (3), timp, hp, str.

Year

2005

Duration

21:00

Composed

7/10/2004 - 2/9/2005

Dedication

James Levine

Comments

multiple drafts exist

Commission

Ronald Wilford in honor of Levine's 60th Birthday

THEOLOGOUMENON was commissioned by Ronald A. Wilford in honor of James Levine on the occasion of his Sixtieth Birthday.

THEOLOGOUMENON takes its inspiration from a text, excerpted below; it was suggested by Ronald A. Wilford, from the works of Maximus Tyrius, a Second or Third Century neo-Platonist:

God himself, the father and fashioner of all that is, older than the sun or the sky, greater than time and eternity and all the flow of being, is unnamable by any lawgiver, unutterable by any voice, not to be seen by any eye.
But we, being unable to apprehend his essence, use the help of sounds and names and pictures…yearning for the knowledge of him, and in our weakness naming all that is beautiful in this world after his nature…
Why should I further examine and pass judgment about images? Let men know what is divine. Let them know: that is all…
I have no anger for their divergences; only let them know, let them love, let them remember.

                                                                                     Charles Wuorinen
                                                                                     New York
                                                                                     August 2002