Premiered by the TAK ensemble at the Penn Sound Collective concert of graduate composers in March 2019.

Charlotte Mundy, soprano
Laura Cocks, flute
Carlos Cordeiro, clarinet
Marina Kifferstein, violin
Ellery Trafford, percussion

Recently, two ideas I enjoyed exploring separately in my pieces were the notion of time, and playing with the Polish language. “Tik-Tak” combines both. I wrote the text in Polish because “tak” bears several meanings, including yes, such as, as if, as much, etc.; moreover, there are countless of sayings involving the word “tak”, few of them being used here. In regard to the notion of time, this piece is about time passing by mercilessly -- independent of, and indifferent to any of our human events and interactions. Any meaningful moment that we would like to hold on to, vanishes irrevocably. No matter what happens, time goes on, as if nothing had happened. In addition to presenting my personal take on time, “Tik-Tak” also contains “Tak”, the sound I wanted to use in this piece, given it was written for the TAK ensemble.

Tik - Tak for soprano, flute, clarinet, violin, and percussion (2019)

Ania Vu