In late 2016 I finished a duo for violin and cello commissioned by the Norwegian violinist Ole Bøhn. It was performed by Bøhn and cellist Christopher Gross (Talea Ensemble, NY) at the Vigeland museum in Oslo February the following year.

I continued working on and revising the piece for many years, but I was never completely happy with it until I decided on the somewhat radical decision to cut away half of what I had and work the remaining fragments into four short duos.

In this process, I was inspired by Italo Calvino's thoughts on 'lightness' in his "Six Memos for the Next Millennium," particularly finding inspiration in this specific passage:

"I would suggest this: my working method has more often than not involved the subtraction of weight. I have tried to remove weight, [...] above all, I have tried to remove weight from the structure of stories and from language."