Hailed for his innovative and eclectic musical career, Benjamin Verdery tours regularly throughout the US, Canada, Europe, and Asia, performing at venues and festivals around the world.

Ben has recorded and/or performed with such diverse artists as Andy Summers, Frederic Hand, William Coulter, Leo Kottke, Anthony Newman, Jessye Norman, Paco Peña, Hermann Prey, John Williams, hip-hop artist Billy Dean Thomas, beatbox/vocal percussionist Marc Martin, and Nano Stern.

From Rainer Maria Rilke’s Book of Hours (Translated by Anita Barrows)

I’m the one who’s been asking you-- It hurts to ask--Who are you?
I am orphaned
Each time the sun goes down.

I can feel cast out from everything And even churches look like prisons.

That’s when I want you--
You knower of my emptiness,
You unspeaking partner to my sorrow-- That’s when I need you, God, like food.

Maybe you don’t know what the nights are like
for people who can’t sleep.
They all feel guilty--
The old man, the young woman, the child.
They’re driven through darkness as though condemned, Their pale hands writhing; they’re twisted

Like a pack of frenzied hounds.

What’s past lies still ahead, And the future is finished.

They see not the faintest glimmer of morning
and listen in vain for the cock’s crow.
The night is a huge house
where doors torn open by terrified hands
lead into endless corridors, and there’s no way out.

God, every night is like that.
Always there are some awake,
who turn, turn, and do not find you.
Don’t you hear them blindly treading the dark? Don’t you hear them crying out
as they go farther and farther down?
Surely you hear them weep; for they are weeping.

I seek you, because they are passing right by my door. Whom should I turn to, if not the one whose darkness
is darker than night, the only one
who keeps vigil with no candle,
and is not afraid—
the deep one, whose being I trust,
for it breaks through the earth into trees, and rises,
when I bow my head, faint as a fragrance
from the soil. 

Intermission

rain clouds approach… in rain…

separate drops fall together… heavy water…

as the wind sings to the rain… after a rain (the smell, the mist) …

the wind's forgotten melody… partial recall of a storm…

gentle rain underwater… liquid sunshine… rain returns…

a downpour's secret… the calming of the water… a child's first rainbow…

discovering the rain falls equally on all things

World Premiere

Introduction…   Nice and Fileno flirting… Kisses…

The sky gets dark | Nice is frightened…

Wind | Rain | Hail |Lightning | Thunder… Nice laments

The storm increases | Lightning | Thunder… Nice laments

Fileno comforts Nice and they find comfort in a cave…

A monster appears… Nice passes out in fear…

A fight between Fileno and the monster… Fileno injures the monster…

The monster laments… The monster dies… The sky clears up…

A rainbow appears … Nice and Fileno cheer up