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Programme Note

Composer Note:

[The potato] begins its life at its most coherent, losing its shape and substance with the growth of its sprouts. The sprouts will, of course, become other potato plants, but, seen from the point of view of the potato, they are agents of death and decay. A piece based on the life of the potato, such as my composition, Spud, might begin with the coherence of all musical voices and move towards their independence, much in the way that a series of variations might bear successively less resemblance to their theme.

—David Lang