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Several events during the time of this work's composition led to its title and the choice of musical material it incorporates. Principal amongst these was the birth and first few weeks of life of my daughter Maria, whose favourite musical-box tunes make their way into the audio part, which is created from the sound of waves breaking on the seashore and the low notes emanating from the live instrument on stage. From the structuralism of the opening and closing sections, where the intervalic relationships of overtone series are transferred to the realms of harmony and rhythm, to the minimalism and dream-like surrealism of the middle section, The Birth of Venus is about childish, unsophisticated beauty; the musical characters in the piece are depictions of characters from the kind of stories which are presumably written for children, but which in reality are addressed to the child within all of us.
