About this Work

Suspiro (sigh), for violin and piano, was written in 2019 for my wife, Winnie Cheung, an accomplished tango pianist and community builder for tango throughout the U.S. and Argentina.  It uses a simple bordoneo pattern (3+3+2) throughout as a kind of backbone, to which snaking chromatic lines are attached and interweave with one another.  The descending minor second is a definitive feature both harmonically and melodically, emblematic of the musical ‘sigh.’  Hence, the title.