Lera Auerbach: “Icarus”
The Icarus myth has preoccupied Western art time and time again. It tells of the high-spirited cockiness of the boy Icarus, son of Daedalus who built artificial wings for himself and his son, attaching them with wax to their bodies and thus enabling them to escape imprisonment on Crete. High up in the air, Icarus felt godlike and ascended ever higher towards the sun, so that the wings began to melt and he finally fell abruptly into the sea.
