This is a work of uncompromising rarefaction -- as befits a contemplation on the profoundest subject known to anyone -- and it is thus unlikely to be many people's favourite! It is so terse that I strongly recommend that newcomers to the work listen to it twice in the first sitting. Also, its full effect will not be achieved if it is listened to close to other works. Ideally there would be at least 10 minutes clear of other music before this work and at least an hour afterwards. This may seem unrealistic, but nonetheless I joke not.
The subject of this contemplation has a variety of
names, such as the clear light, primordial consciousness, ground
luminosity, pristine awareness, Dharmakaya, Mahamudra, and so on, but
essentially it is the subtlest, innermost level of consciousness of
every sentient being, and is the fundamental 'empty' nature and essence
of all objects and phenomena and indeed everything that the mind
experiences. It equates roughly with what non-Buddhist mystical
traditions call the Universal Consciousness, The All, or the godhead,
but not with the personal God of most religions. In Buddhism the part
of this fundamental level of consciousness that manifests in an
individual being is called Rigpa or the path luminosity, though many
writers confuse the issue by using the word Rigpa interchangeably with
Dharmakaya, but in any case the difference is in viewpoint rather than
substance.
I had originally thought of this work as a strongly
Buddhism-connected work. However, I was haunted in an extraordinary way
by the music, both in sound, shape and its inner substance, for I had
and still have a strong electricity-up-the-spine impression every time
I played it back, that this was an extremely ancient work, previously
composed, which I had simply recreated from some deep source within my
consciousness, and it predated Buddhism probably by many thousands of
years. I now see the work as being of very deep
and universal mysticism rather than Buddhism or indeed any religion or
named path.
The words of this work had to be adapted somewhat in order to impart the necessary rhythmic inflections to what, in their English translations, proved too unrhythmic for me to use. To the average Western person the texts of this work will seem total gobbledygook, but I can report from my own experience of recognition of the innermost essence of consciousness that the texts do a pretty good job in conveying something of what, although it can be experienced directly, is in fact beyond all concepts and thus beyond any possibility of direct and accurate description.
This innermost essence is not a light in any conventional sense, but rather a vivid and clear awareness, devoid of any conditioning or framework of reference. It is perfect and untaintable, and is the nature of all buddhas (fully enlightened beings). That perfection is also the fundamental nature of each one of us, but in all of us ordinary people it is more or less obscured by our habitual tendencies and karma (the consequences of past negative thoughts and actions over countless lifetimes). The various mystical spiritual paths give us means to gradually uncover our underlying perfection and compassionate splendour and eventually become manifest buddhas or enlightened people ourselves. For a fuller explanation in everyday language, see my detailed web page Crossing the Threshold of Enlightenment.
Samsara, referred to in the text, is the term used by Buddhists to cover all the realms of cyclic rebirth and suffering. In their teachings humans are but one of those realms. I nowadays distance myself from the Buddhist teachings on such matters, for, as in other religions, various distortions had been perpetuated for the purpose of maintaining control over people rather than giving them the most self-empowering truths. The final (Tibetan) exclamation in the work, 'Emaho!', means approximately 'How wonderful!'.
In Meditation on the Clear Light there is no earthly emotion - just a rapt absorption and sense of mystery and wonder. There is no fast music, and the dynamics remain mostly level and quiet apart from a few coloristic effects. The scoring is very sparing. For example the choir is a double one for antiphonal effects only, not for elaborate textures or massive sound, and the poor trumpeters - three of them - have only five notes to play, albeit telling ones, and the orchestra lacks trombones and tuba. However, full string sections playing very quietly are preferred rather than reduced string sections playing less so, to achieve the most spacious and detached sound; any vibrato of individual players should not be heard, for 'sweetness' of sound is quite out of place here.
The backbone of the main part of the work is nothing more than two very slow but gradually accelerating ever-ascending chromatic scales a minor third apart and out of sync -- effectively in close canon. Both of these are harmonized a minor third below, in lower octaves. Against this continual spacious shifting between consonance and dissonance, sections of the choir weave austere fragments of mostly unharmonized chant-like melody, punctuated by the refrain 'How amazing!' in modal three-part harmony, usually with strange woodwind sonorities (equivalent to use of mutation stops on an organ), using variants of a motif used in my 6th Symphony.
Words sung by the choir
The nature of all is open, empty, naked like the sky.
Luminous emptiness, without centre or boundary: the pure, naked Rigpa dawns.
(adapted from The Tibetan Book of the Dead, referring to the dawning of the ground luminosity during the death process)
(these 2 lines are repeated, in canon)This Clear Light, spontaneously present, from the beginning never born,
Is the child of Rigpa, itself without parents -- how amazing!This pure wisdom, source of its own origin, by no-one created -- how amazing!
Unborn and holding no seed of death -- how amazing!
Evidently visible, it has no-one to see it -- how amazing!
Having wandered through countless lives in samsara, it has come to no harm -- how amazing!
Having seen buddhahood itself, nought has it gained -- how amazing!
Existing in everyone everywhere, unrecognised is it still -- how amazing!
And yet still you hope to attain some other fruit than this -- how amazing!
Even though it's the thing most essentially yours, you seek for it elsewhere -- how amazing!
This Clear Light, spontaneously present, from the beginning never born,
Is the child of Rigpa, itself without parents -- how amazing!
(the words of Padmasambhava as quoted in The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying, freely adapted)I am, yet there is no 'I' to behold -- how amazing!
(added by the Composer)This Clear Light, spontaneously present,
from the beginning never born --
How amazing! Emaho!
(these 3 lines sung simultaneously)