Renowned Los Angeles flutist and UCLA faculty member Sheridan Stokes commissioned this sonata for flute and piano. Written in three movements, the piece traces an emotional arc from darkness to light. The opening movement establishes a moody improvisatory world with dramatic chromatic harmonies and long yearning flute lines. Special expressive devices include pitch bends, key clicks, harmonic overblowing, and a concluding multiphonic that evokes a distant train whistle.

 The atmosphere of the middle movement lightens to a quieter, nostalgic world. A gentle repeating figure echoes between flute and piano like ripples in a pond, set against a descending figuration of arpeggios. Sweet sadness gives way to a joyful finale bristling with jagged rhythms and polymeters, in the key of G sharp Minor no less. Several high C sharps and D sharps may earn me the ire of flutists, but they lend the piece a powerful ringing and unmistakable energy.