Exoplanet Dawn, Op 289

The isolated astronauts land on a planet circling Alpha Centauri B 4-1/4 light years away. It is not the exoplanet now known (which is closer to the star than Mercury to the sun), but one at the appropriate distance to have liquid water, and an atmosphere similar to Earth. The melancholy of the barrenness is represented by the use of the English Folksong, "Turtle Dove", through the middle of the work. In 1919 Ralph Vaughan Williams did a setting of this song, and through a recording I became familiar with the melody which I thought appropriate here...