The Secret Gates of the House of Osiris

Abstract

"Part of the Egyptian Book of the Dead depicts the journey of the Sun (Ra). After it sets, the Sun traverses twelve kingdoms of the underground before rising again; the journey is thus a gradual progression towards light. The work was completed in December 1986, and dedicated to the cellist Christian Wojtowicz who played in the first performance in Hobart a year later. The formal structure of Secret Gates consciously echoes Sitsky's earlier work for solo piano, Twelve Mystical Preludes after the Nuctemeron of Appollonius ofTyana, in which twelve short pieces are linked strongly by their thematic material into a cycle. Secret Gates, scored for the somewhat unusual combination of flute, viola, cello and piano, uses the same procedure. The twelve movements are: 1. Hymn to Osiris 2. The Boat of Af Ra 3. The House of Tet 4. The Realm of Seker 5. The Shrine of Seker 6. The Four Sons of Horus, the Four Forms of Osiris and the Nine Serpents 7. The Secret Road of Ament 8. The Gods of the Circles 9. The Serpent Mehen 10. The Mystic Sceptre 11. The Eternal Set 12. The Celestial Waters" -- Peter Campbell