I once had a dream that I was in my mother’s womb. In the dream, I experienced these things: the joy of being in the warm womb, the pressure and obsession that I must be born before long, and the joy of coming into the world through the suffering and pain of the process of birth. These are deep experiences that will stay in my mind for all time [and which] I have tried to recreate in music (...). In this work, there are many influences from the musical language of gagaku, the ancient Japanese court music that is the womb of my music.

Toshio Hosokawa