We are proud to present the premiere of Nathan Currier’s composition Gaian Variations, and we hope that you will wish to come and celebrate Earth Day 2004 with us at Avery Fisher Hall, Lincoln Center, New York City, on April 21^st, 2004.

The subject of Currier’s work is James Lovelock’s Gaia hypothesis. The Gaia hypothesis was given its name by a novelist - Nobel Laureate William Golding - and developed by a maverick independent scientist who has described his work habits as being like those of an artist, so what could be more natural than that this material has now sparked the imagination of a composer?

Considered by some to be one of the most important concepts of our epoch, it hardly matters any longer whether the scientific community ultimately discards or embraces Lovelock’s view of the Earth as a single living organism — it has already sparked one of the liveliest scientific debates in recent history, reinvigorating philosophical questions of old, and attracting many who had never before had an interest in science. To those with concern for our planet and the life it bears, it provides a new paradigm for considering the many environmental problems of our time – while oddly mirroring ancient ideas that reach far back into the roots of our civilization.

That Currier calls Gaian Variations an oratorio, a sacred form, is appropriate, even if it deals with a largely scientific subject. Lovelock has joked about being the first person to start a new religion based on a scientific principal, and, in fact, much of the earliest enthusiasm for Lovelock’s idea came from those interested in its religious overtones, perhaps even to the detriment of the very real and significant science involved. But if something of a New Age following ensued, Currier will likely disappoint those followers — his oratorio is not at all about the goddess Gaia, but resolutely about the modern science itself. Currier just assumes the sanctity of his subject.

If to some the idea of fashioning art from the ideas of science might seem esoteric, consider that Moby Dick also looked at a large manifestation of life, the whale, from a brazenly scientific point of view for a novel – and is constructed, moreover, rather like a giant set of variations. Hopefully, Currier’s work will no more be perceived as ‘difficult’ than was Walt Disney’s Fantasia, which climaxed on some of the most notoriously abrasive music of the early 20^th century, Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring, set to a depiction of then current scientific ideas about the origins and early evolution of life, and has been loved by young children ever since.

Currier’s work should certainly be of interest to those who follow contemporary music, as it seems to do many things in fresh ways - its combining of orchestral textures with chamber music in a new light, its use of electronics, but only as ‘range extensors’ of speed and pitch, its stretching of the boundaries of what one sings about, with its presentation of recent scientific discoveries in a musical work, and above all, its taking the lens of the new Gaian view of nature’s operations as the basis for reexamining one of 20^th century classical music’s core struggles, that between tonality and atonality.

Like a traditional oratorio, the work is designed as a series of short movements, which are clustered into three acts, with each act divided in two parts. Most of the movements are vocal settings of words by James Lovelock himself. But the libretto intertwines selections from Lovelock’s writings with texts by Loren Eiseley, which recount the origins of the idea of a living earth within a western scientific framework, centering on James Hutton in the late 18th century.

Between Lovelock’s explanations of the current evidence for viewing the earth as an organism, we see the unfolding of the basic idea over time: its proposition by Hutton, its rejection by his followers, and its eventual resurrection in our own time. The Eiseley texts give the work its narrative element, its dramatic arch, and help us to anchor our understanding of the contemporary Gaian idea in the context of the evolution of geology, Darwinism, and other key concepts of science.

The work is musically unified by just a few thematic ideas that are continuously varied throughout the work. Their development creates a primary parallel to the meaning of Gaia theory itself, which states that all the life on our planet, along with the oceans, rocks and the atmosphere, function together as one massive superorganism.

In the new Gaian view, while the mechanisms of variation and selection follow the traditional Darwinian model, the sense of adaptation is altered — for life in Lovelock’s view is always adapting its environment as well as adapting to its environment. This, Lovelock has stated, is perhaps the most important part of the idea. Hence Currier’s title, Gaian Variations. Gaian Variations uses the very word variation with a different meaning than, say, the Goldberg Variations.

The Gaian Variations project is also meant to be larger than just a single performance or musical work. In this critical time for our environment, as we confront such major issues as climate stability and change, both as scientific concerns and, increasingly, as political debate, making the layperson become more interested in such matters is one of the vitally important educational tasks of our time. Therefore, a discussion/seminar to precede the April 21st event is currently in the planning stages, which will entail a panel discussion on Gaian science and current research. Further, funding permitting, this website’s role will culminate in a non-live webcast of the premiere, which would remain online for three years after the premiere and be used for Earth Day Network’s other programs as well as for Earth Day events around the country.

Vaclev Havel, when he was awarded the Liberty medal of the United States of America in 1994, gave a surprising speech, in which he said that the people of the world need to rethink the way that they live, based on the Gaia hypothesis. Unfortunately, very few people listening to him were familiar with it. What could inspire people to learn about this idea? Perhaps a work of art can sometimes make a difference.