Thomas Clark – composer / digital artist

Tag: angels

  • The Final Angel

    2025 . . . synthesized sound montage . . . 7 minutes

    Electronic sounds from previous ANGELS pieces (The Fourth Angel, Angels of Bright Splendor) make layered counterpoint for a dark, unearthly montage. Music from another piece, String Theory, originally imagining spinning subatomic energy, provides an ironically human voice, both frantic, engulfed in the threatening sound environment, and soaring hopefully above it.

    Global warming is already devastating the earth and all life on it. The Bible’s Revelation 16 tells of seven frightening angels:

    “The fourth angel poured his bowl on the sun, and it was allowed to scorch people with fire; they were scorched by the fierce heat.”

    The other six angels and their bowls wrought plagues of painful sores, bloody seas, bloody rivers, darkness.

    “Finally, the seventh angel poured out his bowl into the air, and a loud voice of doom came out of heaven, saying, ‘IT IS DONE!’ There were noises and thunderings and lightnings; a great earthquake. Every island fled away, and the mountains were not found.”

    The Final Angel

    Watch a YouTube video with abstract images:

  • Unseen Voices

    2018      double SATB choir, orchestra      duration: 9 minutes

    Horn in F, 2 Trumpets in C, Trombone, Bass Trombone, Triangle, Timpani, Strings

    Angels in most world religions and mythologies seem to serve one of two functions: wielding controlling power over the physical world or over human affairs; or making spiritual announcements to humans. In giving voice to the unseen voices of angels and other spirits, the choir pronounces the names of Native American and Hebrew spirits representing the power and beauty of nature – wind, moonlight, rainbows – and messages of peace and assurance. Here is our chosen cast of angel/spirit names:

      Gǎoh – chief wind spirit (Iroquois)

      Yaogah – bear spirit of the north wind (Iroquois)

      Neoga – fawn spirit of the south wind (Iroquois)

      Oyandone – moose spirit of the East Wind (Iroquois)

      Amitolane – rainbow spirit (Zuni)

      Nokomis – daughter of the moon (Algonquin)

      Gabriel – archangel of justice, annunciation (Hebrew)

      Maris stella – star of the sea (Latin)

    Ave maris stella is an 8th-Cen. Roman plainsong antiphon for Vespers. The text speaks of Gabriel announcing peace to the world.

    Gabrielis ore, funda nos in pace. (Latin)  “From the mouth of Gabriel, establish us in peace.”

    Epi gis Eireni anthropois. (Greek)  “On earth, peace to all people.”