The Crossing and conductor Donald Nally are perhaps best known for the volume and depth of their commissions; they regularly take on challenging topics, as here in their 42nd album, BESIEGED in which they examine time spans — human life, aging, and the mysteries of the cosmos.

BESIEGED unites three contemporary composers whose choices of texts are widely varying: Stacy Garrop sets stories of Lydia Davis in which decay and disintegration are metaphors for old age and isolation. Robert Maggio alternates psychiatrist Dr. Alzheimer’s notes on his first diagnosed patient with her confused, frightening experience. And Christopher Jessup looks skyward, with Whitman, to ponder unanswerable questions about our being in relation to the stars. The Crossing, with its signature expressive precision, brings these works together, balancing sadness and wonder into a coherent journey of clarion sound.

Track List

• Stacy Garrop: In a House Besieged: Prologue
• Stacy Garrop: In a House Besieged: I. A Natural Disaster
• Stacy Garrop: In a House Besieged: II. Almost No Memory
• Stacy Garrop: In a House Besieged: III. The Cottages: 2. Lillian
• Stacy Garrop: In a House Besieged: IV. Order
• Stacy Garrop: In a House Besieged: V. In a House Besieged
• Stacy Garrop: In a House Besieged: Epilogue
• Robert Maggio: The Woman Where We Are Living: I. Die englischen Stimmen
• Robert Maggio: The Woman Where We Are Living: II. The reactions of the pupils to light
• Robert Maggio: The Woman Where We Are Living: III. Wie Heißen Sie?
• Robert Maggio: The Woman Where We Are Living: IV. When she was brought from the isolation room (I will not be cut)
• Robert Maggio: The Woman Where We Are Living: V. Wo wohnen Sie?
• Robert Maggio: The Woman Where We Are Living: VI. When the doctor enters the room (make yourself comfortable)
• Robert Maggio: The Woman Where We Are Living: VII. Welche Frau?
• Robert Maggio: The Woman Where We Are Living: VIII. She acts as if she were blind (myself in order)
• Robert Maggio: The Woman Where We Are Living: IX. When she died, she was examined (here and everywhere, here and now)
• Christopher Jessup: Astronomia: I. When I Heard the Learn'd Astronomer
• Christopher Jessup: Astronomia: II. The Mississippi at Midnight
• Christopher Jessup: Astronomia: III. Kosmos