Helga Arias: Milk spilt on a stone

(Submitted by Musikagileak)

Helga Arias (b. 1984, in Bilbao, Basque country) studied composition with Mario Garuti (Conservatorio G.Verdi Milan) and Beat Furrer (Kuntsuniversität Graz) and computer music with Javier Torres Maldonado (Conservatorio A. Boito Parma) and Karlheinz Essl (Universität für Musik und darstellende Kunst Wien). Her music has been performed in several festivals and music halls around the world. Her work establishes relations between acoustic and electronic resonance and explores the microscopical variations of the sound phenomena. In her most recent pieces, she also includes subtle theatrical aspects and collaborative processes. Her music is edited by Babel Scores. In 2020, she was a composer in residence with the ICE Ensemble (USA). She is currently a Doctoral Candidate at the Anton Bruckner Privatuniversität Linz (Austria). She lives and teaches in Switzerland.

Milk spilt on a stone (2017) for saxophone quartet

We that have done and thought,
That have thought and done,
Must ramble, and thin out
Like milk spilt on a stone.

–W.B. Yeats “Spilt Milk”

The expression “spilt milk” refers to a mistake that cannot be rectified. Once a liquid is spilled, it follows its own course, spreads, forks and continues to advance without return until it disperses and disappears, absorbed by other materials. It is irreversible, irretrievable.