As a visual artist uses chiaroscuro (the presence of bright and shadowed elements) in a picture, Sørensen (who has used the Italian art term as the title of one of his pieces) uses contrasts of dark and light musical sounds in his music. This, like most of his music, portrays a strange, moody world. The sound is similar to György Ligeti¹s textures of many small figurations (for instance, in the strangest of the music of the film 2001, a Space odyssey).

Sorensen wrote this piece as the prelude in spirit to his earlier piece "Funeral Procession"). The deserted churchyards of the title are rural burial grounds along the western coast of the Jutland Peninsula. Located well away from the shore when they were opened, these very old and deserted plots are now so close to the eroding beach that they are being eaten by the ocean. Sørensen notes that there is no exact programmatic association between this image and the music.

© Joseph Stevenson, Rovi