A shared line for three instruments
Organ, cello, bowed acoustic guitar. That is the ensemble for Kali Malone’s Burning Song. Lucy Railton and Stephen O’Malley rejoin the composer after their work together on Does Spring Hide Its Joy. This time there are seven pieces, distributing the sound of an established trio across shorter spans. The formal question begins between chords: which tone travels from one to the next?[1]
Jonathan Williger’s liner notes make the change specific. Malone moves away from the canon form that shaped much of her earlier organ work. The pieces proceed more linearly and connect through bridging tones. The relationship between successive chords takes precedence over the repeated entrances of a melodic line. The same instrumental ensemble is organized through a different treatment of time.[1]
The Thomaskirche sessions in Leipzig put the ensemble in one space. Across two nights in August 2025, Francesco Donadello positioned more than 20 microphones around the room and close to the instruments. The Bach Organ was completed in 2000 with tuning systems based on historical baroque practice. Beside it, cello and bowed guitar contribute to the same acoustic environment.[1]
From commission to album sequence
The pieces did not all originate together. The first half grew from a commission for the 2023 Venice Music Biennale and was presented at San Pietro di Castello. The final three were composed in the month before recording. These two periods make the album sequence more than a straightforward transfer of an existing concert programme: earlier commissioned work meets newly composed material.[1]
Bridging tones may provide an important route through that sequence for the listener. When a short piece ends, a shared tone may make the next feel like a continuation as well as a beginning. An alternative is that cohesion comes mainly from the trio’s common instrumental colour and the church acoustic rather than compositional links. Both explanations belong in an account of the album’s form.[1]
The closing My Eve My Dawn carries that relationship into its title. The liner notes describe it through connections between endings and beginnings. The value of the shorter form lies in allowing each piece its own conclusion while leaving a tone for the next. For this release, numbered SOMA078, the line to follow is how the three instruments move together and carry a shared sound into a new chord.[1]