On my first afternoon in Lahore, exhausted from a long flight and the 120 degree heat, I fell asleep on my bed at the Parkway Hotel. Within an hour, I was awoken by the sound of the call to prayer coming from the two mosques on opposite sides of the hotel. Their muezzin tried to outdo each other in their intricate ornamentation. The combined sound was spectacular. On return visits to Lahore, though I have made sure I was in the Parkway at the appointed time, I have not been able to hear that sound again. Instead on Lahore's busy streets, I have found myself choked by the crowds, the noise, and the biting pollution that has blanketed the city in blue smoke.

I was reminded of my experience in Lahore, when I visited Aleppo. Atop the ancient citadel, I heard the call to prayer moving in waves from one distant mosque to other closer mosques until the city was covered in a web of intricate related melodies.

I had long wanted to revisit these memories in my music, eventually settling on its use in a perhaps unlikely place: a work for solo flute. I took the fragment from Aleppo and laid it over the entire structure, using it to give the harmonies and tempo fluctuations of the piece. The surface of the work, however, is a complex abundance of pitches that allows my sonic memories only an occasional moment to peek through.