Sidney Corbett on “Paradiso” (from the program of the premiere):

“… the first question was how it would be possible to transform a poetic work of such consumate perfection into another guise without sacrificing the integrity of the original. After numerous intensive discussions, a form began to emerge between a reading, concert and music theatre, in which the text and the music would evolve in their own respective universes yet remain in dialog with one another. The choice of text passages was exceedingly difficult. Although “Inferno” is the richest in dramatic content, any music of any kind would always hold a ray of hope which would be entirely incompatible with the sheer and utter hopelessness of the text. In “Purgatorio” on the other hand, music and even specific musicians are often the subject of the text, but here the problem emerges that music could become illustrative and thus superfluous. Only in “Paradiso”, where Dante’s text is transformed into a cosmological architecture, did I see room for music, music which could enjoy the necessary freedom to unfold without being unduly bound to visual or literary images …
I imagined an instrumentation which allowed for a maximum in flexibility, expressivity and intimacy: the string quartet seemed to me to be ideal. The work is divided into 11 Canti with three Intermezzi. The ensemble itself is often subdivided into solos, duos and trios, which sometimes comment on or question the text, at other times however formulate an independent view of paradise.”