Gods of the Dead is a piece about the many figures which have been
believed to guide us between life and death, as well as the uncertainty of
knowledge and belief.  In the first two sections, four human chanters read
texts from Homer, Virgil, the Hebrew Bible, Flaubert and Allen Ginsberg,
while laptop musicians sample and transform their words.  The last section
simply invokes by name those who watch over and guide the dead.

While it at first may seem morbid, the piece is intended as a meditation on
belief and transition throughout and beyond our current existence.

This piece was written specifically for the Laptop Orchestra, and as such,
involves a piece of software written in the ChucK language, and a set of
written instructions, but no musical notation.

The software instrument is designed to sample the chanters, acting not 
unlike the chorus in a Greek play; it also allows the laptop players
to alter and distort the words of the chanters.

Gods of the dead was performed twice, on May 30th and July 3rd, 2008.

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