Si / … ins Schloss … – for women’s choir, strings, percussion and celesta
duration: ca 5’
instrumentation: choir + gtr.2hp.cel-timp+3-str
written in 2026, commissioned by Continuo
first performance: 2026-06-20 by Continuo, Dameskoor Arabesk and Kevin Hendrickx at Muziekcentrum De Bijloke, Gent
program text:
For their project In Search of the Beyond, featuring The Planets, Continuo asked Ward, their composer in residence, to create a short piece focusing on the planet Earth, a notable omission from Holst’s suite. Continuing his habit of using chemical elements in titles, this time the choice fell on ‘Si’, the symbol for silicon: one of the most common elements in rocks and as such an indispensable building block of the entire Earth’s crust.
The quest for The Beyond can be interpreted as a question about what lies beyond life, the great beyond. It is in this sense that Si / … ins Schloss … gives the Earth a voice. For whilst the other planets are characterised by an eternal quality, it is precisely the ephemeral that distinguishes the Earth and its inhabitants.
The large woodwind and brass section, which features prominently throughout the rest of the programme, now gives way to a more intimate orchestral sound. And what could be more fitting than the human voice to express a question about Life and Death? The women’s choir, which also gives voice to the mystical in Holst’s Neptune, strikes up a slow lament and sings, with Rilke’s words, of the shock that ripples through the universe when that door, which inevitably closes one day, slams shut for good far too soon. Transience may well be characteristic of the earth and may even be the source of all beauty, the sorrow of loss, however, is universal.