Sean William Calhoun | Composer and pianist

In Chasms Deep was inspired by (and takes its title from) a passage generally known as Shallan’s Lullaby from Brandon Sanderson’s novel Words of Radiance. The piece uses a few motives – the quintuplet split between two players, a melodic line that forms gradually out of the marimbas’ quintuplets, and a series of five chords introduced in the vibraphone. Throughout the piece, these ideas shatter and reform, culminating in powerful quintuplets, then breaking apart into the fragments from which they emerged.