"In the summer of 2011, while I was visiting my friends Don and Sally Roberts in Santa Fe, Sally asked me if I would be interested in writing a new choral work for Don in celebration of his upcoming 75th birthday. The idea appealed to me very much, so I readily agreed to write the piece. Since Don has enjoyed a lifelong interest in the American Southwest Pueblo people and their customs, Sally provided me with several Tewa texts, in English translation, to consider for musical setting. I was particularly drawn to the imagery of Song of the Sky Loom, so that poem became the basis for the new work.

The music begins with two baritone soloists singing an introductory 'call-and-response' to which the entire chorus eventually responds. The opening line of text is first presented in fragmented form, as if voices from all areas of nature gradually rise up and then merge into a unified chordal texture. As the text turns to the imagery of weaving, the musical texture, accordingly, bec