The Place Where You Go to Listen by John Luther Adams

Author:John Luther Adams
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Wesleyan University Press
Published: 2009-03-19T04:00:00+00:00

A Composer’s Journal Part III—In The Place

MAY 27, 2005

We’re back on the tundra. Once again Cindy and I have met Gordon at our favorite spot in the Alaska Range for our annual spring camp. Twenty-five years ago we used to come here in the second week of June. Now we come the last week of May. With the changing climate, the season has shifted a full two weeks.

This is the cusp of winter and spring. There’s still snow all around. But the tundra is emerging, in burnt brown with patches of new green here and there. A few migratory birds are already present. Others are arriving daily.

Our camp is perched on a high bluff on the edge of a massive river valley. From this lookout we like to pass the long evenings watching the weather, the light and the animals.

A pair of long-tailed jaegers circles endlessly in search of food. A large cow moose with unusual coloration—dark chocolate belly and legs, light blonde head and back—browses nearby with her newborn calf. In the willow and alder flats far below, half a dozen caribou are grazing. The small lakes scattered all around dissolve gradually from rich violet into smoldering gold. To the south the sky is intense lavender. To the north it glowers deep gray-blue.

In the failing light we hear a hollow buzzing that crescendos into a growl. Three tundra swans fly right past us, winging into the dusk.

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