This piece is a relative of a much bigger work of mine, called Vast Ocean, which was written for trombone, orchestra and live electronics for Donaueschingen Musiktage 2005. Both pieces started developing at the same time, although K's Ocean took a much longer journey, on and off until its world premiere at London Sinfonietta's Sonic Explorations festival in October 2009. This has resulted in the piece having different dimensions to its sibling.

Both works are influenced by Stanislaw Lem's novel Solaris. For me, the most interesting part of the story is that the Solaris, the ocean, gives different perspectives on a character's past experience. In this piece, the solo trombone is the main character (Kelvin in the novel) and the live electronics, which are directly related to the soloist's performance, are the ocean.

Programme note © Dai Fujikura (edited by Harry Ross)