The new recording from harpist Rachel Talitman and viola player Pierre-Henri Xuereb centres on the poignant work by Judith Markovich, When Words Fail. The world premiere of the work was performed by the artists on this disc in December 2023.

When Words Fail is inspired by a poem scratched on a patient's wall in an insane asylum, in 1917. A pastor created a rubbing of the words with stub pencil and paper following the patient's death, however, it was later found to be an ancient Jewish poem called "Akdamot".

Four movements express its concepts and embrace three spontaneous selahs - short pauses common in the Psalms. Imagine, it says, if we could fill the oceans with ink and turn the skies into parchment, it would drain the oceans dry to write the love of God above.

Judith Markovich, an award-winning clarinettist and principal under the renowned Louis Lane, earned a Master's in Performance from the Juilliard School. She began composing at 65, and in relatively few years she had her first symphonic premiere, Emergence. Her works were recorded, performed, and broadcast throughout the Americas and Europe, and selected for the 2022 International Composers Festival in Sussex, UK. Combining her unique instincts as a performer and vivid imagination, Markovich's compositions create a musical odyssey of triumph over the adversity.