Inner West Community Band (https://iwcb.org.au/) plays
In 2014, Mackey became the youngest composer ever inducted into the American Bandmasters Association.
This grand and romantic piece is the composer’s adaptation of the middle movement of his 2014 piece ‘Wine-Dark Sea: Symphony for Band.’ The full symphony tells the tale of Odysseus and his journey home following his victory in the Trojan War.
‘This Cruel Moon’ is the song of the beautiful and immortal nymph Kalypso, who finds Odysseus near death, washed up on the shore of the island where she lives alone. She nurses Odysseus back to health and enchants him with her song as she weaves at her loom. Seven years pass and the tapestry becomes a record of their love.
But Odysseus longs to return home, to his wife and son. Kalypso is heartbroken and yet, she unravels her tapestry and weaves it into a sail for a raft for Odysseus to travel back across the ocean. She watches him go; he does not look back.
source