Robert Hughes

flute, miguk piri (or Eng hn), Cheng (doubles psaltery), contrabassoon, trombone, percussion (5 players), celesta (doubles harmonium), violin (doubles metal pitcher if only 4 perc), and cello (doubles snare drum if only 4 perc).

For thirteen players, large mixed ensemble, with Western and Asian instruments, five percussionists, contrabassoon solo.

Composer's note: "Music for the Kama Sutra” was written in the summer of 1966 for the San Francisco Ballet and was inspired by my love of Indian sculpture (voluptuous or transcendent, but almost always in posed ‘ballistic’ forms), which only increased with the exhibition Ancient Sculpture from India, circulated by the National Museum of New Delhi and presented in San Francisco. The original Kama Sutra is an ancient treatise on love, partly dealing with intimate erotology, and largely concerned with the outward sociological aspects of relationships. In the ballet, it is used in the most general way to establish a frame of reference and a reality other than our own.

The music is one continuous movement through five sections, in which trans-ethnic sonorities are unified by extensive percussion writing. (additional note in score)