Paul Nauert's (b. 1966) compositions, mainly for solo and small-ensemble forces, reflect an ongoing interest in intimate/private discourse as a model for musical rhetoric, the coloristic use of harmony, and an engagement with different qualities of pulsation and its absence.

Most of the music on this CD - composed after his ALS diagnosis, with the exception of three pieces from the late 1990s - represents a freer and more intuitive way of composing, with less reliance on computational tools, than Nauert's earlier work. He calls Episodes and Elegies and A Distant Music, the larger pieces on this disc, "post-algorithmic composition."

He writes: "My music changed in response to the disease. I explored new ideas, new techniques, and points of contact with other music I love (Mel Powell, Harrison Birtwistle - J.S. Bach, in far more abstract terms) out of a sense that these things couldn't be postponed until later. My customary algorithmic techniques gave way to more intuitive processes, and elaborate compositional designs were replaced by patterns I could retain fully in my memory, as the physical act of composition grew slower, and as my external workspace became limited to my view of the computer screen positioned in front of my eyes by an assistant."