'...the piece that made the strongest impression...was Abysm, a BCMG commission from 2001 from Danish composer Poul Ruders. This took as its inspiration Shakespeare's phrase "dark backward and anysm of time", and spun from it something unfathomably deep.'
Abysm is the title of a work which indeed plumbs the emotional depths: its long first section beginning with sustained ejaculations of sinister intent and ending with subterranean sonorities that fade into troubled silence. A short brutal, clattering second section ("Burning") leads to the pan-filled "Spectre": not easy listening but a hugely impressive essay in controlled intensities.